Talk:Ethnic cleansing/Archive 3

• Newspaper refs. I simply must demand that sources in this delicate and controversial historic subject be actual published historians citing proper
  verifiability
  . Why am I so critical of the refs? Because the silliness of this claim is beyond comprehension to me - the crucial question: who performed the ethnic cleansing? is one that has no answer at all. All we get is "Yugoslavs", but what does that mean? Civilians? Certainly not, no kind of imaginary anti-Italian riots took place - it was a police state. The Yugoslav Army? Again, no question: absolutely not. There isn't a single instance between 1947 and 1953 of Yugoslav authorities forcibly throwing out and deporting Italian families just because they were Italian. Indeed, such a move would be suicidal for Yugoslavia - a neutral state in the Cold War, a state flirting with the West in hopes of support against Stalin. The whole thing is unimaginable.
• Re:"It comes as no surprise that DIREKTOR opposes the use of the term ethnic cleansing". Of course not, it is a full-time job reverting (mostly banned) Users such as User:Brunodam, User:PIO, User:Giovanni Giove, User:Ragusino, etc... I am opposed to this kind of blatant POV-pushing and I shall remain so. Do not be "surprised".

If you would have bothered to read my post, you would not have had to write such a long and irrelevant post. I did not ask you to prove a negative (that it was NOT ethnic cleansing), I explicitly asked you for sources for a positive (that it WAS a voluntary exodus). Surely there are historians and others who have written about it, so I ask you once more to provide sources supporting your view, that it was voluntary. Just as I have provided sources (not long and pointless personal opinions) saying that it was ethnic cleansing. Rather than ranting on about my sources and about your own speculations about the events, provide us with some sources supporting your view of a voluntary exodus. Then we can move the matter forward by discussing the views presented in the sources of both opinions. That is the usual way to deal with differences of opinions, not long and emotional personal outbursts with little factual content.JdeJ (talk) 17:08, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I read your post and understood it completely, though I cannot say you did the same. I understand that you just want me to prove something you order me to prove. You believe that I am going to dig through sources looking for some argument you yourself defined, that I shall be unsuccessful and that that will prove your point. Not finding sources stating it was "voluntary departure" wouldn't do anything to prove your point that it was ethnic cleansing. Naturally, sources which use alternate terms than "ethnic cleansing" abound everywhere, yet you believe you can cloud this fact by insisting on express confirmation of "voluntary departure". Crucially, you want sources that expressly state that the movement was "voluntary", which is logically assumed unless one explicitly calls it "involuntary". I've seen more of these sort of logical games than you imagine. Nice try, though. Pamela Ballinger, which you yourself quoted, calls the Istrian exodus simply "migration", in no way hinting, by using that term, that it was somehow "involuntary". Indeed even "involuntary migration" (not used anywhere) is not an interchangeable term with "ethnic cleansing". That source, by using another term for the events, is effectively a source against the term "ethnic cleansing". It means this scholar opted to use a different term than "ethnic cleansing".

JdeJ, you're not discussing the crucial point here, the validity of the "sources", thus I am forced to repeat (please read and respond fully):

Thank you, that is a nice list and I have no immediate objections to it. We should certainly take these sources you list into consideration when editing the article.JdeJ (talk) 22:23, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

May I ask, what exactly is your position on article content? --

The entire paragraph written by an obvious Croat: "During the 1990s it was used extensively by the media in the former Yugoslavia in relation to the Croatian War of Independence, since Serb paramilitary forces and JNA engaged in forcible removal of Croats and other non-Serbs from areas of Croatia occupied by rebel Serbs. Rebel Serbs and JNA have committed widespread and systematic acts of persecution (murder, violence, detention, intimidation) against non-Serb population creating a such coercive atmosphere, atmosphere of fear, that targeted population had no option but to flee or to be deported by force. These acts were carried out from at least August 1991. The displacement of non-Serb population which followed these attacks was not merely the consequence of military action, but in fact its primary objective.^[1]"

needs to be removed or substantially rewritten. It is entirely too biased and one sided to be in a reference work like Wikipedia. I tried to completely rewrite it and disovered when saving my changes and additions that it is a protected article, whatever that means. If one studies the United Nations reports, reads Sell's Slobodan Milosevic' and the Destruction of Yugoslavia, David Halberstam's War in a Time of Peace, Noel Malcolm's Bosnia-A Short History, and his Kosovo-A Short History, it is obvious that the forceable movement of ethnic populations and attrocities were perpetrated on all sides of the conflict and not only by the Serb para-military forces and Jugoslavian Federal Army (JNA).

Secondly, despite the disclaimer that ethnic cleansing is not to be confused with genocide (which according to the United Nations and the Hague ICTY judgments is a correct statement), this article contradicts that warning note and says in the text that "they are synonymous." Admittedly, the international media who reported on the events during the devolution of Yugoslavia, frequently incorrectly used the terms ethnic cleansing and genocide - causing confusion about their legal meanings (as defined by several international agreements commonly accepted as International Law) by the general population of the world.

Michael M. Toler —Preceding unsigned comment added by Michael Toler (talk • contribs) 09:07, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

when King Abdullah was given eastern Palestine, aka east of the Jordan, Jews were made to leave. This happened in 1922. This was ethnic cleansing.

The Palestinian exodus would be an instance of so-called ethnic cleansing that is not based on the definition given in the lede, since the Israelis did not persecute an ethnic minority (were the Arabs a minority?) but rather prosecuted a war that was forced upon them. Other aspects of the definition are also arguable. But is it true that the Palestinian exodus has been termed "ethnic cleansing" by "academic or legal experts"? And if not (such) experts, is it so noted, as the disclaimer says?

Three references are given (43,44,45) as initial support, and all lack page numbers or specificity. The first reference is to Morris (43), who does not use the epithet "ethnic cleansing" anywhere in the book. While he uses the term "cleansing" frequently, he uses it to refer to "cleansing" of an entirely different type. Examples below. Numbers refer to page numbers of the reference given. It is clear that Morris is talking about a strategic "cleansing" of enemy forces during war. My italics throughout.

464: - "quick and immediate cleansing [tihur] of the conquered areas of all the hostile elements..."

260: - "to 'clean' all the Arab villages that were occupied by the Egyptian military force".

235: - "the continuation of intimidation and cleansing activities as a first stage in operations[geared to] the destruction and conquest of the enemy forces and bases."

65: - "cleansing, conquest and destruction of enemy villages in your area."

518: -"cleansing and destruction of the enemy force..."

The Gelber reference (44) doesn't mention "ethnic cleansing" either except in the appendix to make a case against Pappe's (45) use of the term. "In Pappe's words, reminiscent of Khalidi and Massalha' ... these allegations [of ethnic cleansing] rely on a single paragraph of Plan D's 75 pages and refer to one of the Plan's many aspects while taking this paragraph out of its context and ignoring or blurring the Plan's real task: defending the forthcoming Jewish state from outside invasion being assisted by domestic Arab subversion." pg 303 of the Gelber reference [3]

So two out of the three references given do not support the contention of "ethic cleansing." We are left then with Pappe, though still no page number. Now the disclaimer says that "Where claims of ethnic cleansing originate from non-experts (e.g., journalists or politicians) this is noted." Pappe is arguably not an academic or legal expert. Yet it is nowhere stated that Pappe - the third source given accurately as a supporter of the notion of "ethnic cleansing" in relation to the Palestinians - has acknowledged bias and is admittedly not a respecter of facts, rather motivated by ideology and subjectivity.

"Indeed the struggle is about ideology, not about facts. Who knows what facts are? We try to convince as many people as we can that our interpretation of the facts is the correct one, and we do it because of ideological reasons..." [4]

"My bias is apparent despite the desire of my peers that I stick to facts and the 'truth' when reconstructing past realities. I view any such construction as vain and presumptuous. .....In short, mine is a subjective approach, often but not always standing for the defeated over the victorious..... pgs. 11-12 [5]

Pappe may be an academic, but a subjective one and an admitted disrespecter of "facts" and "truth" and one who "stands for" the defeated. Academic experts do not "stand for" one side or another. That is the function of the propagandist or political activist. There is nothing wrong with being such, but we must not publish their opinion as fact.

The second sentence of this section refers to the 1967 war: "...during which 280,000 to 325,000 Palestinians, approximately 145,000 of which were refugees from the 1948 war, fled or were expelled by Israeli forces once again." While the numbers may be accurate, this is not an issue of "ethnic cleansing" based on our definition, but rather one about people made refugees by war. Here at least we have the page numbers so that we can check out our references. McDowall [6] says specifically, "In 1967 many more lost their homes in Palestine. By December, 245,000 had fled from the West Bank and Gaza Strip across the Jordan, 116,000 had fled from the Golan further into Syria, and 11,000 had left Gaza for Egypt. Of these 145,000 were UNRWA refugees uprooted for the second time. Many more left in the following months, either forcibly expelled by the occupying authorities or choosing not to live under Israeli military government." People who flee or choose to leave can hardly be said to have been "ethnically cleansed." The last sentence lacks all specificity and does not really support the sentence that these numbers were expelled by the Israeli forces. ("Many more left .... in the following months")

The last reference is that of Robert P. G. Bowker in Palestinian Refugees: Mythology, Identity, and the Search for Peace pg 81, which is a footnote page and doesn't refer to "ethnic cleansing". The only reference to "ethnic cleansing" is on page 90, [7] refers to the West and the Serbians, is an analogy, if a backhanded accusation.

In summary, the Palestinian exodus does not fit the WP definition of an "ethnic cleansing," the sources do not support the accusation of ethnic cleansing, and the terms of the disclaimer are not met.

I think you said it best. hell, I think the whole section of 'examples" of ethnic cleansing is a problem, as the term is very new, and previous instances of it have been debated by scholars. You also make great points with reference to I/P, as there is substantial twisting of words and stories that go on.

talk) 00:50, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, Tallicfan20. I don't doubt you are right about the "examples" of ethnic cleansing being a problem. My knowledge of most of the others is extremely limited. In fact there are some peoples listed whom I did not even know existed, let alone that they were ethnically cleansed. The lists are nuts, imho. Every group in the world wants to be listed as "ethnically cleansed" and no group wants to be listed as the "cleaner". It would be funny except it really is inflammatory and shouldn't be used without the strongest non-controversial evidence!, in my opinion.

talk) 03:39, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

You didn't argue for this : "Based on the definition given in the lede, the Palestinian exodus was not an instance of "ethnic cleansing". Why doesn't the 1948 exodus fit the definition of an ethnic cleansing (in wikipedia) ? 81.244.176.173 (talk) 14:36, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

The lede says "Ethnic cleansing is a euphemism referring to the persecution through imprisonment, expulsion, or killing of members of an ethnic minority by a local majority to achieve ethnic homogeneity in majority-controlled territory." The Jews did not imprison or kill members of an ethnic minority ... the Jews were the ethnic minority... the purpose was not to achieve "ethnic homogeneity" but to defend themselves from being wiped out as an ethnic minority themselves. The war was not initiated by the Jews, but by the Arabs. When the Jews expelled a population it was to prevent the villages from being used as a base for attacks against them, not to establish ethnic homogeneity. After the tide turned and the Jews began to win the war, they advanced through Arab villages, clearing the territory ahead of them. To this day over 20% of Israel is Arab, Arabic is an official Israeli language...Arabs are citizens...Arabs receive aid from the state. Islam is an official religion. The accusation that the intention was to achieve homogeneity at the expense of the Arabs is simply [biased] opinion. The Jews just wanted to survive in the area that was designated as the Jewish homeland and state. Really, they were so depleted a population (immediately after WWII) in 1948 that it is a wonder that they did not lose entirely. It is important to read

talk) 03:26, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the events before 15 May 1948 were not an ethnic cleansing but just for your information :

• Jews were the 'ethnic minority' in Palestine but the first exodus occured in the territories dedicated by the Partition Plan to the Jewish State and there, they were the majority. More, when Zionist Jews and Palestinian Arabs are compared, Palestinian Arabs were far more weaker
• For the killings, see :
  Killings and massacres during the 1948 Palestine War
  ... Few before May 1948.
• At Lydda and Ramle (Dani), in North Galilee (Hiram) and North Negev (Yoav), the aim of the expulsion was clearly to get rid of a "dangerous" Arab minority.

You should read a little bit more about the topic and only come back after. 81.244.41.108 (talk) 17:09, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I think you've said it best, tho it is important to remind people again what Benny Morris has said about the overall picture, that "Most of the people who were displaced fled their homes. A small number were expelled. Most fled their homes as a result of the war, the fear of battle, the fear of being attacked, the fear of dying. A small number also left because of the economic conditions. And a small number were advised or instructed by their leadership, as in Haifa in April 1948, to leave the country." I put that so now we even have a quote that most Arabs fled, and very few were expelled. And again, Morris says also that the refugee situation is 100% the Arab's fault for going to war and rejecting partition. Not to mention, UN 194 doesn't even say "must," but "should," about refugees, which means its not an order.

talk) 09:21, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Still not undefinitely blocked ? Strange... 81.244.41.108 (talk) 17:10, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, a simple google books search [8] provides tens of examples characterizing what happened to the Palestinian as ethnic cleansing. There are fewer sources for many of the other listing on the page. The "controversy" over "Palestine" tends to result in the setting of special rules. But I don't think the case has been made for this entry's removal and the multiple scholarly sources using the term to describe what happened to the Palestinians is evidence enough to support its inclusion. Tiamut^talk 16:29, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, the sources given do not support the epithet. Nor are they properly sourced with page numbers for quote. Why don't I delete it and someone can return it properly sourced?

talk) 03:26, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I have added it back in. One of my sources does not appear to have been mentioned previously: The dark side of democracy: explaining ethnic cleansing, which mentions Palestine as a case. The idea that the cleansed group needs to be an ethnic minority is ridiculous: that is the part that has no reference and needs to be removed. As the article states correctly, the phrase became well-known during the Yugoslav wars, but it was definitely not reserved for cases where an ethnic minority was the victim. In Croatia, the Croats were the majority and the Serbs were the minority, yet cases in which the Serbs expelled Croats were called "ethnic cleansing". In Kosovo, actions by both sides were called "ethnic cleaning": it's difficult to define the minority there, when the Albanians were the minority in Yugoslavia (then the country) but the majority in Kosovo itself. I think that Palestine should definitely be included and I suggest that the definition at the top is altered with new references. Epa101 (talk) 10:26, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I don't see how your source supports your assertion -- perhaps I missed something. Can you say exactly how it does? Also, other elements of this issue have been addressed below. Perhaps you could address those points as well.

IronDuke 17:50, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Try reading what Epa101 linked to IronDuke. Its a scholarly work by Michael Mann about ethnic cleansing as practiced in different places around the world. One relevant passage from the book reads:

Israel is main the contemporary example of settler-conquerors. For half a century, Israelis have been cleansing the occupied territories of native Arabs, most murderously in the late 1940s; renewed again in the Jewish land-grabbing of the past few years. Israelis have mainly cleansed within their own occupied territories, devising the typical settler state:democracy for the settlers, lesser rights for the natives - what Yiftachel (1999) accurately terms an ethnocracy, a demos only for the ethnos.

There are other references there are well (read them). This, combined with the many other notable, scholarly works characterizing the events of 1948 war and subsequent Israeli policies as ethnic cleansing provide more than enough evidence as to the appropriateness of including Palestinians on this page. There is no simply way to get around it. Tiamut^talk 18:35, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I did better than that, I read what Epa cited: Page 143... I didn't see a reference there to ethnic cleansing... did you? As for "many other notable, scholarly works" we have Nur-eldeen Masalha who, according to Morris (who is cited), edits with bias and Morris himself, who seems to correctly locate the issue as complaex and nuanced, not as an attempt at sloganeering or demonisation. Is that enough to establish "ethnic cleansing" here as a matter of fact, rather than opinion?

IronDuke 00:14, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

It is well established that bias is not equivalent to a lack of reliability. In my opinion, again, the proper way of dealing with this is presenting both "sides" of the argument, not just pretending one does not exist. nableezy - 00:36, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Not sure it's all that well establilshed, but in any case, yer begging my question there, Hoss.

IronDuke 01:05, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps I am overstating how well established it is, but every discussion I have seen at RS/N has been unequivocal in rejecting the idea that bias means a lack of reliability. I dont exactly see how I am begging the question, but Ill take your word for it. nableezy - 01:10, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm not saying biased = worthless, I'm saying biased =/ fact. That's the quesiton I'm raising. Is it a fact that Israel is/has ethnically cleansed Palestinians? No, I think. It's a loose term that has definitely been applied here, and we can certainly note that, but by putting it on this page, we're acting as though it were fact.

IronDuke 01:16, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

If we just say in a list that this is one of them then yes we say it is a fact. But if we add some nuance, such as "The Palestinian exodus has been cited as an example of ethnic cleansing by ... . They say that because of ... . This is disputed by ... . They dispute it because ... ." In that scenario we are not saying it is a fact, only that some people say it is and some say it isnt. I cannot see why such a formulation would be objectionable to anybody. nableezy - 01:33, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Well, maybe if it was in its own section, titled in some way to indicate it was disputed, then yeah. But as it is, a reader would have a hard time figuring out that WP wasn't effectively putting its imprimatur on the notion that Ps's were EC'd by I's.

IronDuke 01:47, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry but my typing "page 143" was a mistake: I was using the search engine on Google Books, and looked at the wrong place. I've altered the reference to 519. See also pages 129-131 in this book, pages 194-195 of this book, pages 10-14 in this book and even page 190 in a Greenwood Encyclopedia of Children's Issues (not as in an encyclopedia for children but for people interested in children's welfare). There seems to be a chapter on the subject starting at page 251 in this encyclopedia, but you can't view the content for free. I think this is a well-accepted case. Those who argue against it say that there might not have been a government plan for the expulsion, but then it's also disputed that there were government plans for the ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia and Rwanda; I can quite believe these were all spontaneous acts of brutality, as sadly humans do too often. Epa101 (talk) 09:21, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

This article looks as if it may support inclusion of the case, but I'm not able to read it all. Glancing down the list, there are certainly many other examples on there which are more disputed than the 1948 Palestinian case. The one about Mexican gangs expelling Blacks in the US cities is hardly a case of academic consensus. The one about Jews' removal from Gaza and the West Bank has no academic references and, out of its five journalistic references, two are from the BBC which makes no reference to "ethnic cleansing" or any moral analysis of the expulsions. I don't think any case is agreed on by everybody: even if we take the recent case of Yugoslavia, the Croatian government claims that Operation Storm was not ethnic cleansing or any violation of international law, and that was the biggest mass movement of the era. I think people are applying high standards to Palestine 1948 here, but doing this consistently would remove probably all examples from the article. Epa101 (talk) 09:37, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Our own source here, as quoted in the lead of the master article, disputes this. "

IronDuke 15:49, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

   464: - "quick and immediate cleansing [tihur] of the conquered areas of all the hostile elements..."
   260: - "to 'clean' all the Arab villages that were occupied by the Egyptian military force".
   235: - "the continuation of intimidation and cleansing activities as a first stage in operations[geared to] the destruction and conquest of the   enemy forces and bases."
   65: - "cleansing, conquest and destruction of enemy villages in your area."
   518: -"cleansing and destruction of the enemy force..."