Techwatch:
The other side of Wikipedia
Jul. 22,
2008
David
Shamah , THE JERUSALEM POST
As most
of us have come to realize, it's too late for Wikipedia, as far as Israel is
concerned. The "Npov" crowd (an acronym for the supposedly Neutral
Point of View of Wikipedia editors) have basically installed themselves in the
positions of editorial authority that control the site.
Wikipedia
editors gave CAMERA a hard time for trying to do something (how dare they!)
about the consistent anti-Israel opinions on the Wikipedia site (http://tinyurl.com/55v9l9).
And then there was my own exchange with a "defender of Wikipedia's
editorial freedom" (http://digital.newzgeek.com/Wiki-Gone-Wild.html),
whose Wiki user page has been seen in the past sporting a Hizbullah flag,
witnesses tell me, even while he emphatically states "I will /*not*/
apologize for working strenuously to fix Wikipedia's severe neutrality problems
when it comes to Israel."
So, for
someone looking for the truth about Israel, Wikpedia is pretty much a dead end
- it seems to carry only the "truth" as approved by the international
Arab propaganda machine. But other Wiki projects prove that it's Wikipedia
that's out of step - and that it's possible to conduct a publicly editable Wiki
web site without having to hand it over lock, stock and barrel to people with a
very clear agenda about Israel.
According
to http:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiNode, there are nine other sites
that are sponsored by the Wikimedia Foundation (the hosts of Wikipedia) that
attempt to process and deliver information about various topics. In other
words, they're like Wikipedia, except for specialized areas. And after a
perusal of their offerings, it's refreshing to be able to report that out of
the ten Wiki Foundatiom projects, it's only Wikipedia that is sown with
anti-Israel seeds; the other sites, dedicated to travel, news, photos, etc.,
seem quite free of anti-Israel bias.
I
probably even shouldn't be writing about these sites, lest the Wikipedia crowd,
hungry for new thrills, rush in and ruin what are currently perfectly
acceptable sites for Israel lovers. But I list the sites not to alert them, but
to further impress upon those upset over Wikipedia's sad loss of objectivity
that it doesn't have to be this way - proving for once and for all which side
is running an "organized campaign" to insert its opinions in places
where historical facts should reign supreme.
For
example, take the Israel page on the WikiNews site
(http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Israel). Reuters and AP could learn a lesson or
two from this site on how to write an objective article that deals in fact, not
opinion. In the May 23 incident in which Israeli planes confronted an
unidentified aircraft that turned out to be Tony Blair's plane, Reuters wrote
"Israeli fighter jets scrambled to intercept a plane carrying Middle East
peace envoy Tony Blair this week after his pilots failed to identify
themselves," the emphasis being on intercepting the plane carrying the
'peace envoy.' I could spend a whole article just analyzing that sentence, in
fact!
Compare
that to the WikiNews version: "Israel scrambled two fighter jets to
intercept a suspicious aircraft that was failing to respond to air traffic
control (ATC) and had moved into attack positions, only to discover that it was
carrying International Middle East peace envoy and former Prime Minister of the
United Kingdom Tony Blair." A lot more factual - and accurate description
of what actually happened. Ditto for the other news features listed at the site
(which does not seem to be attracting too many people, based on the number and
frequency of articles appearing there.)
Perhaps
even more impressive is WikiTravel (http://wikitravel.org), which does have
lots of traffic and has a page dedicated to Israel as well. As a site meant for
the international backpacker set (that's the impression I get), WikiTravel is
refreshingly more objective on Israel than some of the other sites geared to
this crowd. It's a pleasure to see "Jerusalem" listed as Israel's capital
without an "asterisk" next to the name. For the city description of
Jerusalem, the site says that it is "the political and spiritual capital
of Israel, as well as city sacred for millennia to three religions: Jews (the
site of the Temple), Christians (the scene of Christ's Passion), and Muslims
(site of the al-Aqsa Mosque)." Nary a word about "occupation,"
"illegal settlements," and all the other jargon that really has
nothing to do with what a travelogue is supposed to be discussing.
Naturally,
there is a section on "Disputed territories." And while I don't
dispute Israel's rights in Judea and Samaria, I can understand how others would
- after all, Israel didn't annex these areas, like Jerusalem and the Golan. The
Israel site describes "the Gaza Strip, West Bank, and East
Jerusalem," and directs users to a "Palestinian Territories"
site for more information, but takes pains to point out that anything written
"is not a political endorsement of claims by either side in the dispute over
the sovereignty of these territories."
That's a
fair statement for a travel information site, and one you would probably never
find in Wikipedia.
On the
Palestinian Territories page, there is as fair and honest description of how
those territories came to be as I have ever seen on the Internet: "The
current Palestinian Territories are a sub-division of pre-1948, British
Mandatory Palestine. United Nations-projected Arab-held areas of the former
Mandate were greatly reduced after the 1948-1949 Israel War of Independence, when
the embryonic state of Israel was first attacked by its Arab neighbors, then
successfully defeated their armies, leading to a re-drawing of the
internationally-recognized borders of Israel."
That
statement's got the timeline - and cause and effect - just right. I've got
other examples from these and other Wiki-sister sites, but space limits me. Now
that the "good" side of the Wiki family has been "outed,"
let's hope that the biggest Wiki of all - Wikipedia - takes an example and sets
itself right.
http://digital.newzgeek.com