Talk:List of state leaders in 2016/Archive 2

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RfC: Inclusion of Palestine as a sub state of Israel

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
First the easy bit: there is clear consensus that treating Palestine as a sub-state of Israel is simply wrong. It's separate or nothing. But which? That depends on whether partially recognised states should be included or not, and opinion is divided. This is further complicated by the fact that this RfC is not actually asking that question. It seems to me that there needs to be a wider RfC on exactly that question, but in the mean time there is I think sufficient support for the inclusion of Palestine pending that discussion. Guy (Help!) 08:48, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

Should Palestine be included as a stand alone state or a sub state of Israel like this:

footnotes

  1. ^ The Palestinian Authority renamed itself as State of Palestine in 2013—a move unrecognised by Israel.[citation needed] It is not to be confused with the proclaimed State of Palestine in 1988—by the Palestinian National Council (PNC) in Algeria—which remains a putative state, in-fact ineffective[according to whom?], despite partial international recognition.[citation needed]

(extended by Spirit Ethanol 09:06, 11 March 2016 (UTC))

Spirit Ethanol (talk) 09:57, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

— Note to closing admin: Kindly clarify if RfC result applies to other pages with same layout (previous year pages, foreign minister pages, ...). Spirit Ethanol (talk) 08:15, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Survey

  • Keep the status quo, prior to 9 February, for three reasons:
(A) Israel still occupies parts of the West Bank, thus Palestine does not have complete control over its territory.
(B) Per the footnote (unlike Taiwan) the State of Palestine is merely only de jure sovereign entity, recognised by other nations mainly for symbolic and ceremonial reasons.
(C) This is an extremely controversial issue, and we must abide to the neutral PoV. Besides, the fact of the matter still stands: No two-state solution has been agreed as of February 2016. To go ahead and list Palestine as a standalone state today will create the patent illusion that an agreement has indeed been reached between the two sides.
I strongly believe that the current revision of the page is WP:POINTy and should be reverted by someone else ASAP.--Neve–selbert 12:03, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
Also, the RfC question is formatted incorrectly, per his addition of unnecessary templates clogging the footnotes.
This discussion is illegitimate as it stands now, as the proposed changes have already been made without consensus.--Neve–selbert 13:59, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
— Note to closing admin: User:Neve-selbert is a participant in edit dispute that led to starting this RfC. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 18:23, 17 February 2016 (UTC)
— Note to closing admin: Spirit Ethanol (as the creator of this Rfc) did not adhere to Section 1 of WP:RFC stating that "Editors are normally expected to make a reasonable attempt to working out their disputes before seeking help from others."--Neve–selbert 21:01, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Palestine is not a 'non-state administrative authority', nor is it some kind sub-state of the State of Israel (that is just dumb) and the footnote is a truly bizarre bit of blogging. Palestine (like Israel) is a partially recognized state. The statement "recognised by other nations mainly for symbolic and ceremonial reasons" is simply not the case. Statehood comes from recognition by other states, not from having control over the territory, not from UN membership and not from what Israel accepts or rejects. So rather than being symbolic and ceremonial, recognition is a critical part of how statehood is achieved. A neutral POV means treating a state as a state and describing the current status using accurate and neutral terms. Sean.hoyland - talk 16:54, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
@Sean.hoyland: Israel occupies parts of the West Bank. Palestine does not have total control over its territory, unlike Taiwan vis-à-vis China.--Neve–selbert 17:09, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
Yes, it is a partially recognized state currently under Israeli occupation, not a 'non-state administrative authority', and it's ISO 3166-2 code is PS. Sean.hoyland - talk 17:42, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
@Sean.hoyland: Logically, the ironclad fact that it is under occupation from Israel means that it should be under the entry of Israel. Furthermore, the Palestinian National Authority simply renamed itself as State of Palestine in supranational forums, i.e. the PLA still exists and has not been dissolved or superseded by any newly-created sovereign state.--Neve–selbert 17:59, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
Treating Palestine the same way reliable sources like the International Standards Organization treat Palestine is how Wikipedia is meant to work. Wikipedia is meant to reflect RS rather than the preferences of its contributors.
Also...
etc etc. Sean.hoyland - talk 07:03, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Palestine should always be a stand alone state. It has a President, Prime Minister, Flag, Coat of Arms, Anthem of its own. Almost, every other nation has some form of Territorial dispute and hence should not be considered while discussing the identity of a state. Let it be the headache of the two region & not the world problem. Let the dispute be solved sooner in peace. PALESTINE - A Stand Alone State & not sub state of ISRAEL. - Ninney (talk) 17:29, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
@Ninney: You are trying to illustrate a point, this does not help matters. The fact of the matter is that no two-state agreement has been signed and we must (abiding by WP:NPOV) reflect this reality—however unbearable that may be for some.--Neve–selbert 17:59, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment: Wikipedia has an article at List of states with limited recognition that treats the status of Palestine in some detail. It would be logical to notify all the Wikiprojects that are listed at Talk:List of states with limited recognition about the existence of this RfC. It's possible that whoever created List of state leaders in 2016 was not aware of Wikipedia's other coverage of partially-recognized states. These issues have been heavily discussed elsewhere. EdJohnston (talk) 18:07, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment I don't really have an opinion either way, but it is important that there is consistency both on this list for partially-recognised states – Palestine, Kosovo and Western Sahara should all be treated the same way – and for the other lists of this ilk. Spirit Ethanol also needs admonishing for their failure to respect WP:BRD and breaking WP:3RR. For the closing admin: This debate will attract a lot of people with an axe to grind, so it may be a job of trying to see the wood for the trees by the end. Number 57 20:39, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
@Number 57: I concur and agree, and I must add that Palestine, Kosovo, and Western Sahara are all treated the same way, underneath as part of the entries for Israel, Serbia, and Morocco, respectively.--Neve–selbert 01:39, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
@AusLondonder: Out of interest, why were you not offended by the listings for Kosovo or Western Sahara? Number 57 15:02, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
I agree with #57, only we should be talking about Palestine, Western Sahara and Northern Cyprus which are all considered occupied by the international community. For what it's worth, I think the setup with the "sub countries" (what does that even mean?) is ridiculous but as long as everything is treated equally I don't really care. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 18:03, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
@Number 57: - I am offended by that. I simply reverted Palestine first. I would support separate entries for those states. AusLondonder (talk) 09:01, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
@AusLondonder: You didn't revert anything, you just made a change to the Palestine listing (it was listed like that from the first revision of the article). I'm not criticising you, it's more making the point that this is a fairly standard example of how the Israel/Palestine situation is often singled out for special attention when Morocco's treatment of the Sahrawis is widely ignored. Number 57 23:37, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
@AusLondonder: Whether or not you feel offended is frankly irrelevant. We must be obliged to WP:NPOV. The fact of the matter is: Neither Palestine, Kosovo, or Western Sahara, can be considered sovereign entities in their own right. They are all disputed territories and this is total fact. Taiwan is a notable exception—as in the lead section it specifically defines Taiwan as a "sovereign state in East Asia" (unlike Palestine, Kosovo, or Western Sahara). Also, keep in mind: we are using the term "Palestine" instead of the more apt description of "Palestinian National Authority" due to reasons mentioned in the footnote, i.e. we are not referring to the State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988.--Neve–selbert 09:10, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
  • What is the logic behind giving Taiwan its own entry, but having Kosovo, Palestine, and Western Sahara be sub-units, despite each one being more recognized by UN members (and the UN itself with observer status, in the case of Palestine, equivalent to that of the Holy See) than Taiwan? Also, Northern Cyprus is partially, not un-, recognized. Why are the North American parts of the Netherlands noted under Netherlands, but the Oceanic parts of the U.S., UK, and France, aren't noted under their main entries? Why do French territories get two flags but other nations' territories only get one? Why is the Kingdom of the Netherlands (which has several parts in two continents) given an entry, but the Kingdom of Denmark (which has several parts in two continents) doesn't? Basically, this list has a lot more issues than Palestine. I think maybe a settling on solid rules for the undisputed countries should come before trying to figure out the disputed ones. --Golbez (talk) 21:51, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Agree with Golbez. I'd suggest that listing eg Kosovo under Serbia, Palestine under Israel and so forth is a little perverse and really misses the issue. The page needs two things:
1.A rationale for when leaders of sub-national entities are listed, which needs applying equally
2.A way of differentiating leaders of entities which claim sovereignty, particularly where that sovereignty is part-recognized, from those which don't. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 22:16, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
  • The idea of placing Palestine as a sub-nation of Israel is mind-boggling. Palestine may be being ripped apart into Bantustans, it's population being encouraged to flee, and it's politicians fearful of being killed by Israeli forces, but that doesn't make it a sub-nation to Israel. Sepsis II (talk) 22:23, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment Israeli control over Palestinian territories is not recognized by any country in the world, not even the United States. Furthermore, this directly contradicts with security council resolution 242. "Sub state"! What is this? A metro system? wikipedia.il? The article's title is "list of state leaders" Palestine is a state whether observer or not, sovereign or not, its a state regardless of if you like it or not. --Makeandtoss (talk) 23:16, 11 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Kosovo and Palestine are not sub-states whatever that is supposed to mean. Legacypac (talk) 00:00, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • This looks a whole lot like original research.-Serialjoepsycho- (talk) 00:37, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Separate For a start, including something as a "non-state administrative entity" in a list of state leaders is silly in its own right. If it's not a state entity, it shouldn't be in this list. Secondly, Israel itself does not claim itself to be sovereign over Palestine or of much of the land which it currently controls. Similarly, no government claiming to represent Palestine claims to be subject to Israeli sovereignty. The Israeli position I suspect is to not have it on the list at all, whereas the Palestinian one would be to have it on this list without note. The compromise of putting Palestine under Israel while favouring neither side misrepresents the situation, far worse I feel than the risk of suggesting a two-state solution has been agreed (which is easily explained with a note anyway).
On a slightly separate issue, I think the footnote misleadingly simplifies what is quite a complex topic. It would be better shorter and simply pointing to relevant articles. CMD (talk) 01:09, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment - IMHO, these articles should be limited to undisputed sovereign states. GoodDay (talk) 01:44, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
    • So... no China, Taiwan, Israel, or Palestine? Or if that's wrong you need to explain what you mean by 'undisputed.' Would such a definition include Syria? Northern Cyprus? --Golbez (talk) 06:18, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
      • China & Israel would be included, while Taiwan & Palestine would be excluded. But of course, others can make adjustments to my suggested inclusion criteria. GoodDay (talk) 06:23, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
        • No criteria has been offered beyond the undefined term "undisputed sovereign states." --Golbez (talk) 06:45, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
          • It's not written in stone. Others can make adjustments to it. GoodDay (talk) 06:49, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Israel has no internationally recognized sovereignty over Gaza and the Westbank, including East-Jerusalem. It has occupied these territories in 1967, but that is all. Any entity of whatever nature erected in those territories can therefore logically and in accordance to the Hague Treaties, never be a substate or subdivision of Israel. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 01:52, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment Let's face it, no matter what is decided here some or all sides are going to be disappointed, but lets try to make some reasonable decision here even if it's going to piss someone off, which will probably be the case. A 'sub state of Israel' solution would mean to consider Palestine in the same way as the U.S. considers the Indian tribes like the Navaho and Cherokee. Now, as to whether or not this area should be considered a separate country, let's just duck the issue to higher authority. I'll give an example. Maybe 15 years ago, someone posted a message on the IETF discussion list saying that they should not give one of those countries that had broken out of the Balkans - I think it was Macedonia - its own 2 letter top level domain. I blew the guy off by posting a message saying more ore less "it's not our problem. If a place is assigned a two-letter code by the U.N. then it qualifies to be assigned that code for use on the Internet. The IETF is not in a position to judge what is or isn't a country, and if the U.N. decides it is, then that's good enough for us. You got a problem with the assignment, take it up with the U.N. Security Council."
So my thought is this:

(1) Is the Palestine Authority recognized by several countries (at least ten or even better, twenty)?
(2) Does it have recognition by the U.N., I mean, can it at least send observers to the UN or some of its agencies?
(3) Has it been assigned a UN two-letter code, such that it could have its own Internet TLD?
(4) Has it been assigned a UN three-letter code and country number?
(5) Can it issue its own currency as legal tender, postage stamps as valid for international mail?
(6) Does it have a radio license call sign group (the way the US has K, W, and N, while Mexico has XE and Canada has CI, and as such, can it license broadcast and amateur radio users?
(7) Does it have its own legsl police, fire and military?
(8) Does it have its own courts that can issue authoritative decisions, especially in criminal cases?
(9) Can it issue its own motor vehicle license plates, ship registrations, or aircraft registrations that are recognized by other countries? (10) Can it issue passports?

So let's be a bit generous here, and say that if it meets at least four of these, it qualifies as an independent state, as long as it has some things it issues like currency, boat or plane registrations or passports, then I think it qualifies as sovereign and independent. If it has internal control over its own area, but doesn't really have externally recognized registrations, but does operate its own courts and police, then I think it can be considered a 'sub state' of israel. But if it lacks local control, especially local courts, I think it hasn't yet reached the level of 'sub state'.

Note I did not include whether it controls its own territory or can be considered under occupation. The Vatican and Monaco are both essentially inside of Italy and France, respectively, and the host country would be responsible for protecting them, but the Vatican and Monaco are legitimately recognized as sovereign states. So I left that off. Plus Israel spent years sitting in Lebanon but it was still an independent county.

Maybe these points can provide more light than heat and help give a reasonable objective response on this extremely political issue. Paul Robinson (Rfc1394) (talk) 02:04, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment: Be consistent, as others have said above, but I do not personally like the "sub-state" idea, which seems to me biased in favour of Israel. I would list the State of Palestine separately along with a footnote explaining the situation (also called Palestinian Authority, under Israeli occupation, not full UN member, etc). Like it or not, they are widely recognised as a state at diplomatic level. The rest is in my view not particularly relevant to this discussion and would be better covered elsewhere. —  Cliftonian (talk)  07:30, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment: Benjamin Netanyahu doesn't practice any authority over Abu Mazen. The Palestinian Authority (currently officially-ish called State of Palestine although not even the president use this term and their passports still have "Palestinian Authority" in the coat of arms) is not a sub state of Israel. It is somewhat dependent and influenced by Israel, but not under it's authority or sovereignty what so ever. The Prime Minister (and the President who is more like the Queen of UK) has no authority on the PA. The situation is far more complicated then that in the article.--Bolter21 (talk to me) 08:18, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Include Palestine separately I find it astounding that anyone could seriously believe it is acceptable to include Palestine, which is recognised by 70.5% of all UN members including major world and regional powers such as Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Russia, South Africa and China, as a "sub-state" of Israel, whatever the hell that is. If we are wanting "Western" recognition then a number of European countries, such as Malta, Serbia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ukraine, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Iceland and Sweden. Taiwan is exactly the same. Taiwan claims sovereignty over all of Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Mongolia, parts of Pakistan, India and Nepal and numerous other islands. The area it controls is minute in comparison with its desired control. What has happened here is extraordinarily offensive and stupid WP:OR. AusLondonder (talk) 10:43, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
@Neve-selbert: - could you tell me what reliable sources regard Palestine as being a "sub-state"/integral part of Israel? AusLondonder (talk) 10:45, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
@AusLondonder: I have never, not once, inferred that Palestine was ever a sub-state of Israel. The premise of your question (and indeed the question of this Rfc) is false. All that said, I am quite happy to tell you what countless reliable sources regard the West Bank as being occupied by Israel, in all but name.--Neve–selbert 22:15, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment: Palestine is not a sub or dependent State of Israel. Israel does not claim that, and does not recognize any State of Palestine anyway, at least until an agreement can be reached, which everybody agrees is not realistic in the foreseeable future. But Palestine is not a State neither. A virtual State of Palestine may be recognized by many countries, but you need more than that to be called a State, starting with, well, existing. So it should not even be mentioned in the list of States. Benjil (talk) 11:31, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
    Both Israel and Palestine are partially recognized states. Check out this related RfC. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 06:49, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose This proposal has no connection to reality. Debresser (talk) 14:35, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment - The Rfc question should've been as follows: "How should we display Palestine?". The question then should've been followed with visual examples of the options. GoodDay (talk) 15:51, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
    The RfC question presents a visual layout. The only reference I am aware of states that subentries are for a Quasi-sovereign Subnational Entity. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 20:46, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
    • IMO, a comma should be added between Quasi-sovereign and Subnational Entity. This should reduce the confusion.--Neve–selbert 20:55, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
    The question should've been "How should we display Palestine", which is a neutral. Also, this Rfc was begun prematurely, as there was no attempt to gain local consensus. GoodDay (talk) 20:54, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose Palestine should be no different than Sahara and Kosovo. Sir Joseph (talk) 16:48, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment - A partially recognised state is still a state. Palestine has internationally recognised leaders. They should be listed separately. As should Kosovo and Western Sahara. AusLondonder (talk) 09:01, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose subjective classification and editorialising on the list. Every place that is recognised as a state by a substantial number of other states should be listed as as a state here. People can click on the wikilink to find out more about each one. Moreover, they should be listed here under the names they ask to be known by (or equivalent popular contractions). The Palestinian Authority has asked to be called the State of Palestine, popular contraction Palestine. That is now its official designation at the United Nations. Adding that Israel doesn't recognise it is some sort of joke, right? Zerotalk 11:23, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose UN lists State of Palestine at the same level of Vatican City. Wykx (talk) 00:11, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
comment edited to fix link to UN. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 14:39, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Status quo - Don't change the Palestine entry & close this Rfc, per its mis-leading question. Best to have another Rfc, with a neutrally worded question. GoodDay (talk) 16:03, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment - the initiator of this survey largely confused the audience, making some oppose the proposal, while others oppose the idea (so oppose can be either yes or no, depends on understanding).GreyShark (dibra) 20:29, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Separate - same for Palestine/Israel, Western Sahara/Morocco, Kosovo/Serbia - should be separate, with all three Palestine, WS and Kosovo do have territorial control (regardless exact borders) and certain international recognition (Palestine having the status of non-member state in UN). All three are technically quasi-states, but warrant to be on their own.GreyShark (dibra) 20:29, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
    I disagree.
    1. The State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988 is irrelevant as it is a putative and ineffective sovereign state.
    2. Morocco controls most of the Western Sahara.
    3. Kosovo remains under UN supervision, similar to East Timor back in 2002.
    The status quo is apt for these quasi-entities.--Neve–selbert 20:56, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

WP:CIRCULAR - "Do not use articles from Wikipedia (whether this English Wikipedia or Wikipedias in other languages) as sources." That's policy, you probably know that and yet you copy/paste a string of words about Palestine from a footnote and cite it as part of your decision procedure. Aside from being an invalid source, that footnote has precisely zero value or validity from a Wikipedia perspective because Wikipedia is based on RS (like ISO, the UN, the media etc) rather than the opinions/blogging of its contributors. What is the provenance of the phrase? It probably started here, in List of state leaders in 2013, as the personal opinion of an editor and it has been thoughtlessly carried forward degrading article quality ever since - Wikipedia articles as transmission vectors for the memes living in the minds of its contributors. What should have happened is that the personal opinion should have been removed immediately by editors active at that article because its presence violates WP:OR, a mandatory policy. But back to your position. I can tell you that it will be very difficult for experienced editors who are familiar with the constraints imposed by policy and the state of affairs with respect to Palestinian statehood to understand why an editor would say that the State of Palestine is irrelevant on the talk page of an article called 'List of state leaders in 2016' and expect to be taken seriously, regardless of how many times you have tried to explain your position. My view is that bringing this article and related articles in line with the way reliable sources handle Palestine as a state with a president is simply inevitable. Deviations have a finite lifespan, adjustments will happen eventually because the nature of Wikipedia makes corrective measures (an often slow) but inevitable outcome in my experience. So I think your support for the status quo and opposition to change is not a good investment of your time personally, but it's your life. Sean.hoyland - talk 07:11, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
Well said. It's also worth noting that international acceptance of Palestine as a state in 2016 is a lot more ubiquitous than it was in 2013. Zerotalk 10:22, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
Sigh. More red herrings. My views remain unchanged. The PNA does not control all of its claimed territory as a government, so therefore until it does, we should keep the status quo. Now, perhaps a second compromise: If the Palestinian National Authority were to be governed directly via the United Nations (on par with East Timor until 2002 from Indonesia), then I would certainly support Palestine being separately listed—in which case it would be almost impossible to argue with UN judgment. That (of course) has not happened and the PNA government (Palestine) must be included underneath the state it had previously "seceded" from. Also, it is worthy to note that a considerable amount of territory claimed by the PNA is beyond their reach, and within the reach of Israel. With all the points and arguments assessed, I cannot envisage a better reason to keep the status quo and patiently wait until the situation among the Israelis and Palestinians eventually moves on to the next step. Most do not hold their breath for such a step, so I would suggest we shelve this discussion temporarily until proper change occurs per the Palestinian territories. Moreover, if you wish to discuss this matter further, I would suggest you move this discussion over to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Leaders by year.--Neve–selbert 16:08, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
Keeping the status-quo does not address subentry ambiguity. I am still waiting for sources on your statement "The State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988 has been judged as not worthy of inclusion by the local community". Spirit Ethanol (talk) 16:29, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
This "subentry ambiguity" nonsense was invented by yourself and nobody else. There is no ambiguity, only in your mind there is. Having previously stated that "the State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988 has been judged as not worthy of inclusion by the local community", I would guess that the local community presumed that the 1994 Palestinian National Authority was of a greater importance that that of the putative Palestinian state proclaimed in 1988. We are still referring to the National Authority in this discussion right now, they just happened to rebrand themselves Palestine and the local community chose to respect that in 2013. Treating Palestine as a sovereign state on par with the United States and the United Kingdom is ridiculous and provocative—plus being a flagrant breach of WP:WEIGHT.--Neve–selbert 16:38, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Hello, sovereignty is the "full right and power of a governing body to govern itself", and the article Sovereign state states that "a sovereign state can exist without being recognised by other sovereign states". Palestine is partially recognized state that exercises partial control of its claimed areas. I think that Palestine should be included in the list independently. --NaBUru38 (talk) 22:04, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
Partial control. Yet not full control as with the Taiwan vs China situation. I am afraid recognition very much applies to this dispute.--Neve–selbert 22:08, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
— Note: Above two comments edited for indentation, moved from 'compromise' section. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:01, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
  • We have to deal with three points of view here, namely the Palestinian view, the Israeli view and the international view. The Palestinian view obviously is that Palestine is an independent state. Most of the international community thinks the same, since the State of Palestine is accepted as a member of the UN. The (official) Israeli view is not that Palestine is a sub-state of Israel. So Palestine is either "a state", or it's "not a state", but by all means it's not a "sub-state" according to any of the involved parties. Marcocapelle (talk) 13:27, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
  • Then why is it depicted in a way that strongly suggests we are dealing with some kind of subset of Israël? Gerard von Hebel (talk) 15:51, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
  • @Hebel: The PNA is under the occupation of Israel, and hence underneath the Israel entry. This "subset" voodoo nonsense is complete balderdash. The Tel Aviv District is a so-called "subset of Israel", although I continue to struggle finding where it is—exactly.--Neve–selbert 22:47, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
Neve, as has been pointed out to you before, occupation has nothing to do with sovereignty. Occupation of territory does not make the occupying country the sovereign over the territory occupied. The laws of war. Hague treaties of 1905 are still an important part of international law. You don't seem to understand that. Even if Palestine is a none state entity (which is a WP:OR opinion by the way, it is not an entity that is, or should be depicted as a subset of the State of Israel. The PNA doesn't exist anymore. It has been recast as the State of Palestine and is an observer state of the UN and a partially recognized state. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 02:21, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
@Hebel: I certainly beg your pardon, but—count me mystified—what exactly do you mean by The PNA doesn't exist anymore. As far as I can tell, Palestinian National Authority states in the lede that it currently "is the interim self-government body". Notice "is". From my perspective, the PNA has simply been rebranded as State of Palestine in international forums including the UN. I will, however, take into account the sovereignty vis-a-vis occupation factor, although I must note that it is a grossly fringe argument to suggest that Palestine is entirely independent from Israel. Again, this whole "subset" conspiracy is unfounded and anyone who honestly believes that the article currently displays Palestine as a "subset or substate of Israel" is either living in cloud cuckoo land or is likely trying to conjure trouble per WP:POINT by deliberately aggravating tensions with this contentious issue. Lastly, I am not totally at cross purposes with the concerns that have been raised on this talk page, I would (as a major concession) do away with the footnote that has caused offence with some contributors. But other than that, I still cannot fully comprehend the prime point of this discussion. Besides, there is no two-state solution as of 2016, anyway.--Neve–selbert 03:26, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
Neve, you don't seem to understand that occupied territory is NOT part of an occupying state where International Law is concerned. Your Tel-Aviv semblance is therefore void. While the territory of the projected Palestinian State is partly occupied by Israel, any status under International Law it may or may not enjoy CANNOT be derived from Israel. The Hague treaties are very clear as to what occupation means where International Law is concerned. The present way this article is put together however, suggests an annexation by Israel that is somehow recognized as a status under International Law. If you depict Palestine, as a subject of International Law, connected to Israel as a subject to International Law, that can also be construed as WP:POINT. Of course Palestine is dependent on Israel in many ways, but emphatically NOT as a subject of International Law, and for the purposes of this article we are talking about Palestine as a subject of International Law. This article shouldn't suggest that. At this point it does. Which is wrong. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 16:26, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
Besides. Palestine is now an observer state of the UN, recognized by 157 or so states, and arguably has control over at least parts of it's territory. Remember that Gaza is also part of it! The argument that a state has to have full control over all of it's territory to be a state under International Law is unsound. Many generally recognized states don't have full control over all of their territories. In that I concur with Ninney. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 16:32, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
  • Separate - Although not a full independent state by any means, in none of the views involved is Palestine a "sub-state" of Israel, it can't be listed like that. --OpenFuture (talk) 23:47, 12 March 2016 (UTC)
  • @OpenFuture: The Rfc is over, it finished yesterday and has been unofficially extended. If I may so, please read all of the arguments first before making such a rash judgment. And for the umpteenth time, the "Palestine is listed as a sub-state of Israel" nonsense is nothing more than an unfound conspiracy, nothing more and nothing less. FWIW, a state must be fully independent in order to be listed separate.--Neve–selbert 07:11, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
The RfC is not over yet, kindly refrain from discouraging participation. Please see Wikipedia:BLUDGEON, Wikipedia:REHASH. Nowhere on the page do I find listed "a state must be fully independent in order to be listed separate" nor what does the parent-child state hierarchy mean. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:10, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
I have read those arguments. Listing it as a part of Israel is factually incorrect, no matter which side you stand on in that sad political conundrum. If this somehow contradicts the arbitrary rules of this list, then change those rules. --OpenFuture (talk) 10:13, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
@OpenFuture: Look, Zoltan Bukovszky is the expert in this as he created the layout—besides, I am tired of repeating myself over and over again (for greater insight, I would invite you to read this). Although I must restate that we are in no way whatsoever listing Palestine as part of Israel. So, if anything, this insinuation is really some absurd conspiratorial nonsense made up by none other than the creator himself. To which I say to him @Spirit Ethanol: Please read WP:RFC. It clearly states that the usual course of an Rfc is 30 days. Now, unless you want it to run for eternity, the Rfc is finished and an administrator is overdue to review it. We need a pause or break otherwise we will overwhelm the reviewing administrator.--Neve–selbert 10:32, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
The version being discussed, no matter if you call it "sub-state" or not, clearly lists Palestine as a part of or subordinate to Israel. Denying this is just weird. Listing it like that is not an option, as it is simply factually incorrect, and it boggles my mind why you insist on arguing for it. Even if you take the political stance that Palestine should be eliminated, the fact is that it is as of today, not. Your insistance that the RfC is closed despite it not being closed also does not lend you any credibility. --OpenFuture (talk) 13:25, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
Have you even read the opposing arguments?--Neve–selbert 21:53, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
Yes. What in my above statement do you not understand? --OpenFuture (talk) 11:12, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
I very much doubt that you have acutely read the key opposing arguments. You were simply misled by a misleading question. Now, what exactly do I not understand in your above statement? Quite simply put, your reasoning. It is absolutely nonsensical. This assertion that Palestine is somehow displayed as "part of or subordinate to Israel" is complete and utter balderdash. Palestine—as you yourself have admitted—is not yet a fully independent state, so hence it must be the opposite, i.e. dependent on another state or the UN. Moreover, the only state that significantly infringes on Palestinian sovereign is Israel—specifically, the former is under the occupation of the latter, hence the former is displayed underneath the Israel entry (until Palestine fully receives de facto independence from the Israelis in the West Bank or surpasses international recognition of their neighbour). See Israeli-occupied territories.--Neve–selbert 00:01, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
Your logic is flawed, and your description of the conflict is incorrect and so ultra-simplistic that it saddens me. You need to start listening to those who reply to *you* instead of just refusing to believe that we actually read your depressing replies. --OpenFuture (talk) 06:33, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
Is there a two-state solution? Shall we just pretend there is indeed one—just for the sake of argument?--Neve–selbert 07:08, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment summoned by bot I think that the question Paul Robinson asks above are on point; the fact that the answer to most of them is "yes" would suggest separating Palestine and Israel. Palestine might not have universal recognition as an independent state, but virtually nobody recognizes Israel's sovereignty over the entire Palestinian territory. Moreover, the definition of "leader" as currently in the first line of the article is a very broad one, and the leaders of the Palestinian authority certainly qualify. Vanamonde93 (talk) 16:46, 14 March 2016 (UTC)
  • @Vanamonde93: There is absolutely zero consensus. Local consensus had been ignored prior to the opening of this Rfc (against protocol), and the insinuation that Palestine is somehow displayed as a "substate of Israel" is a false and unfounded one, i.e. the Rfc question is biased and misleading. I explained more here (elucidation).--Neve–selbert 23:59, 14 March 2016 (UTC)
  • Neve, I had read and considered most opinions expressed here before stating my own. You have not been persuaded by any of the arguments advanced above, and the arguments you have advanced do not persuade me; therefore, I would suggest that we don't waste time bandying words here, and wait for somebody to determine the consensus in this RfC. Vanamonde93 (talk) 00:52, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
  • @Vanamonde93: Surely, it must have been wrong for an Rfc to be launched without prior discussion beforehand?--Neve–selbert 01:09, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Discussion

This is an issue covering several articles

It's worth noting that there are articles with similar issues titled things like List of sovereign states in 2011 and List of state leaders in 2009 which are formatted in the same way and which ought to be changed along similar lines.Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:59, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

No change is required (as per WP:WEIGHT). The above Rfc is yet just another effort by some to score pro-Palestinian political points (as per WP:POINT).--Neve–selbert 09:15, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
Above mentioned articles and all such similar instances need to be updated according to outcome of this RfC, this includes List_of_foreign_ministers_in_2016–1950. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 09:58, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
This is complete madness. The Rfc question is outrageously biased, and any outcome of this Rfc will need to be reviewed by an administrator (see WP:VOTE). This has already been a complete waste of time & there is absolutely nothing wrong with the status quo. You are simply trying to make biased political points in favour of Palestine at the expense of Israel per WP:POINT.--Neve–selbert 16:30, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

IMHO, the Rfc question needs to be changed. I'd recommend it being - "How should we display Palestine/PNA in these articles?" GoodDay (talk) 16:33, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

Check out this list or the French counterpart page of this list for a page with a better layout/presentation. Counterpart pages in all other languages do not place Palestine as a sub-entry to Israel. Your insistence on having Palestine a sub-entry to Israel in this and many other lists is subjective classification and editorialization. Outcome of RfC is binding to this page and all other instances across english wikipedia.. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 16:42, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
A better layout? Your sarcasm is appalling. Listen, there is absolutely no such thing as a "sub-entry" on this list. The reason why the Palestinian National Authority is directly underneath the State of Israel as a quasi-sovereign entity is mostly due to fact of it being partly occupied by Israel. The outcome of this Rfc is most certainly not binding, read WP:VOTE.--Neve–selbert 16:51, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
Nowhere in the list do I find mentioned that states that are subentries to other states are quasi-sovereign and occupied by nation in parent entry. This is the subjective classification and editorialization that is subject of this RfC. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 16:58, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
@Spirit Ethanol: View this. Subjective classification and editorialisation? Just your opinion.--Neve–selbert 17:10, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
Subentries are for Quasi-sovereign Subnational entities, Palestine is not a subnational entity of Israel. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 17:14, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
@Spirit Ethanol: Subnational entries are not included on the list. I have never inferred that Palestine is some sort of subnational entity of Israel— although the latter certainly occupies the former's West Bank. Would you dispute that fact?--Neve–selbert 17:24, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
According to Wikipedia:WikiProject_Leaders_by_year#Format:_State_leaders_by_year, subentries only for a Quasi-sovereign Subnational Entity, which is how Palestine is listed now and subject of RfC. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 17:29, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
@Spirit Ethanol: The "Subnational Entity" part does not specifically apply to Palestine. It is rather meant to infer relationships similar to that of the UK vis-a-vis Gibraltar. The Palestinian National Authority (Palestine) is not sovereign (yet), although you are trying to make out that it is, which is false.--Neve–selbert 17:36, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
I'd note that Puntland is currently a subnational entity included on this list, as are arguably the various dependent territories that have been included (territories which mind you are represented differently based on geographical interpretation rather than political status, and with Dutch territories inconsistent with the others, but that's another issue). It is correct however that like Palestine other self-declared and heavily contested states are listed under the countries they split from (putting aside details on how Israel has never officially claimed most Palestinian territory), which has not been made clear in this RfC. CMD (talk) 17:43, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
I concur with the points made by CMD. Furthermore, the Rfc is seriously flawed, and is not worded neutrally.--Neve–selbert 17:55, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
The fact that nobody can understand what the indentation even means is a very strong argument for not having it at all. Zerotalk
I respectfully disagree. I am content with the article as it is at the moment, and this all much ado about nothing.--Neve–selbert 22:43, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
Another way of looking at it is that Wikipedia using a hierarchical approach like this that is inconsistent with the way the International Standards Organization and countless reliable sources handle these matters suggests something has gone wrong. Sean.hoyland - talk 10:44, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
I must stress for the umpteenth time that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the way the article is formatted at present. The current format has worked well for three years, and hopefully for years to come. Any offense is uncalled for, and such contraventions work against both WP:FRINGE and WP:WEIGHT. The reason why most editors seem to think that there might be problem is due to the biased and non-neutral Rfc heading—which in itself is actively discouraged.--Neve–selbert 13:54, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
Golbez made the point well above Neve-selbert - this article is terrible. It is woefully flawed. It has no way of differentiating between Palestine, Abkazhia and Guernsey. There is a debate to be had on where different entities are placed, and what fits where, but it is clear that the page needs to make much clearer distinctions between fully sovereign states (Canada); partially recognized states (Palestine/Taiwan); state with limited recongition (Abzakzhia) and sub-national entities (Guernsey). How it does that is up for debate, but that it needs to do that should be obvious. What it is not is an Isreal/Palestine issue; it applies to Kosovo, Transnistria, and the rest of states with limited recognition. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 16:06, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @Super Nintendo Chalmers: Nonsense. The article is brilliant & I am very much content with it. It certainly does have way of differentiating, e.g. for Guernsey we have (Crown dependency of the United Kingdom) to the right of its name, and for Abkhazia (partially recognised, secessionist state). No debate is needed, this is all much ado about nothing. Have you ever wondered why the Sovereign Military Order of Malta is excluded, while Taiwan is included? The former is considered de jure sovereign yet has zero de facto control over territory, and the latter is considered de facto sovereign and has total de facto control over its territory. Furthermore, I shall be requesting closure of the above Rfc in the coming days, due to its own evident anti-Israel bias and the ironclad fact that there is simply nothing wrong with the three-year-old status quo. There really is nothing to see here—some editor just wanted to make his own point about the Palestinian issue, and it has all spiraled into this nonsense. The fact of the matter still stands: Israel occupies the West Bank. Henceforth, the status quo is apt and should not be changed in any way, shape, or form (until their occupation eventually ceases). Any attempts to compromise on this non-issue will render as futile. We must reflect reality, and that reality is that no two-state solution has come into fruition as of February 2016.--Neve–selbert 16:22, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
While Taiwan is de facto sovereign, what it definitely does not have is de facto control over its claimed territory. Taiwan officially regards itself as a representative of all of China, yet it controls but one large island and a few smaller ones. CMD (talk) 03:22, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Perhaps true, although most of the island of Taiwan is under the control of the Republic of China, and this is really all that matters. On the article Taiwan, the image used in the infobox only includes the island & not the other claimed territory. The criteria could be: If the country is described as a de facto sovereign state in the lead sentence of the lead section of its Wikipedia article, then it qualifies to be in bold...
... For example:
--Neve–selbert 14:56, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
That's all well and good, but that needs converting into a clear and expressed rationale, and writing into the page. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 21:38, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment What I see on reading this whole messy page is User:Neve-selbert arguing almost alone for the status quo. I think it is time for Neve–selbert to accept that the argument is lost. Personally I see some case for a two-level presentation, but no case for Palestine to appear on the second level. None of the other examples are similar. Some of them are secessionist states whose secession has not been accepted by the state they assert their independence from, nor by strong international consensus (eg. South Ossetia). Others are territories that by their own agreement enjoy some degree of autonomy but legally belong to another state (eg. Virgin Islands). At least one I would argue is just a mistake (I wonder if there is any source at all that calls Christmas Island a state). Palestine fits none of those categories. It has not seceded from any other state; nor is any of its territory considered by any other state to belong to any other state, with the sole exception that Israel claims Jerusalem without international support. Given the uniqueness of this situation, we should follow what organizations like the United Nations do in conformity with international consensus: list it as a state under the name it chooses. Zerotalk 09:21, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
    @Zero0000: The argument is lost? Laughable nonsense, the argument is stronger than ever before. I have said what I have wanted to say—to avoid ad nauseam, please ask Zoltan Bukovszky (also a staunch supporter of the status quo) for any further details as to why there is absolutely nothing wrong with the status quo. You simply fail to understand both the layout and formatting of the article(s) in question, hence an unabashed Dunning–Kruger effect. Palestine is occupied by Israel, and no two-state solution exists. Deny this, and you border WP:FRINGE and breach WP:NPOV. I must stress again, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the status quo and I continue to plan to defend it and preserve all the way with all the blood, toil, tears, and sweat I can muster. This all just boils down to WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT by pro-Palestine campaigners per my reckoning. We must respect fact.--Neve–selbert 15:02, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
Nothing will be gained by using straw-man arguments like "Palestine is occupied by Israel, and no two-state solution exists. Deny this, and you border WP:FRINGE and breach WP:NPOV." since no one arguing for change has denied these things. It's safe for you to assume that you are dealing with informed people and that they understand the explanations of the existing layout and formatting perfectly well, but reject them for the reasons they have provided. Sean.hoyland - talk 16:25, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
@Sean.hoyland: Well, if Palestine is displayed as separate from Israel it will surely infer that a two-state solution exists—you have almost denied your own argument. As long as Israel occupies Palestine, the status quo is retained. If Israel decides to pull out tomorrow, then we can discuss changing the status quo. Until then, nothing is wrong with the status quo. I am afraid that most of the contributors whom have landed to this inaccurate Rfc are totally unaware of the explanations of the existing layout and formatting, as they are predictably inexperienced in dealing with it on a day-to-day basis (unlike myself and ZB). They have rejected arguments in favour of no change both because of misinformation plus a manifestation of the Dunning–Kruger effect.--Neve–selbert 16:35, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
The State of Palestine treated as a separate state from the State of Israel does not infer that a two-state solution exists for reliable sources. Reliable sources treat the State of Palestine as a separate state from the State of Israel for the simple reason that it is a separate state. The current structure needs to be made consistent with the likes of ISO, the UN, the media etc. Prominent attributes of the State of Palestine that may merit inclusion in this article with the Palestine entry are best described using language rather than a parent-child hierarchical structure. That is how RS do it, therefore that is how we should do it. Sean.hoyland - talk 16:58, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
@Sean.hoyland: I think you are confusing the Palestinian National Authority for the 1988 State of Palestine. The only reason why we are referring to the PNA as Palestine and not, well, the Palestinian National Authority, is because of the rebrand that happened in 2013. Yes, Palestine is a separate state. Now you are resorting to strawman arguments, yourself. Heck, if Palestine was not considered a separate state, it would not even be on this list. Just ask Scotland and Catalonia, both considered for the purposes of this list as part of the UK and Spain respectively. For a matter of fact, Israel officially has six substates (known as districts, including Tel Aviv), staunchly excluding Palestine. This blatant misunderstanding is really the essence of this flawed and lopsided Rfc.--Neve–selbert 18:53, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
Neve-selbert: This statement: "I continue to plan to defend it and preserve all the way with all the blood, toil, tears, and sweat I can muster." is an explicit rejection of the principle of WP:CONSENSUS, one of the fundamental pillars of Wikipedia. Your sneering and condescending attitude towards everyone who disagrees with you is not appreciated either. Zerotalk 19:21, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
This Rfc definitely needs to be closed & a new (more neutrally worded) one, opened in its place. GoodDay (talk) 19:28, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
@GoodDay: What subentries mean is ambiguous, and it is left to the reader to infer what they mean. Again, only place that documents what subentries are for, Wikipedia:WikiProject_Leaders_by_year#Format:_State_leaders_by_year states they are for a Quasi-sovereign Subnational Entity. Ambiguity is in layout and not the question which seems to be understood by all participants. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 19:37, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
The Rfc question should've been "How should we display Palestine?", with the status quo & your version below shown below, displayed as options A & B. GoodDay (talk) 19:41, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
A simple question for Neve and you, what does it mean for a state to be a subentry of another, and why so is not documented inside list? Spirit Ethanol (talk) 19:48, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
The editors who regularly contribute to the article-in-question on an almost daily basis, i.e. Bogdan Uleia & Zoltan Bukovszky, may be better suited to answer such a question. Although as someone who has practically memorised the layout formatting more than perhaps anyone else, I think I can give a fair (albeit simple) answer. Substates are excluded from the list. There: simple as, really. Why is it not so documented on the list? Because it would clog up the article, and most users (save a few) who contribute to the article understand and accept the three-year-old layout as it is anyway. This is a fuss over nothing, although I concede that a rebooted Rfc may be necessary to ease tensions, if any.--Neve–selbert 20:13, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
It doesn't make the slightest difference if every single editor agrees on what it means. Wikipedia exists for the readers, not for the editors. What matters is what a typical, reasonable, reader will (mis)understand on arriving at the page. Zerotalk 23:58, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
I agree. Hence, no problem whatsoever & no changes needed. We are finally getting somewhere, now.--Neve–selbert 00:04, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
So you don't mind that all and sundry are misled by the format and the wording, the first of which has meaning that can only be guessed and the second that expresses a minority political opinion. You seem to be quite confused about these questions yourself. Someone just asked you what the indentation meant and you only stated what was not included. I'll ask you again: what does the indentation mean? If you don't know, why are you defending it? Regarding the "status-quo" that you claim to prefer, above you wrote "Yes, Palestine is a separate state." but the article says that it isn't a state. And you keep using the fact that it is occupied by Israel as an argument, but the article does not mention that it is occupied. Zerotalk 01:45, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Firstly, I am not the only one trying to defend the status quo—please try and get opinions from the two other editors, i.e. Zoltan Bukovszky and Bogdan Uleia, as well—their opinions could perhaps render as less "condescending" and "sneering" than that of mine (of course, personal attacks, so I shall not rebuff those jabs). Secondly, nobody had complained about this "scenario" before 9 February; someone just happened to be upset that Palestine was not universally considered a sovereign state on par with Lebanon, Jordan, etc. and decided to impose his POV onto the article-in-question. So this "all and sundry" you are referring to is beyond my comprehension, and I simply cannot understand the logic in that argument. Thirdly, read carefully: the indentation is meant to infer the fact that the Palestinian National Authority seceded from Israel, yet has not fully seceded from Israel. Until the PNA fully completes its independence mission and secedes as the State of Palestine, the status quo is apt and fully informative. Fourthly, the 1988 State of Palestine is a de jure but not a de facto state, whereas the PNA on the otherhand is both a de facto and de jure government (on par with the Syrian National Coalition, whose inclusion is similar somewhat). The article-in-question does not need to mention it is occupied, this should already be largely a given per the layout; besides, it would clog up the footnotes—editors and readers alike can click onto the PNA article to read more if they would like to & there is no need to be superflous. This layout has worked fine for years, and I see no convincing nor credible argument against its retention.--Neve–selbert 02:30, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Either you don't know the meanings of the words you are using or you don't know the facts. "A is seceding from B" means that the territory of A was part of the territory of B but A wants to wants to establish separate sovereignty on its territory, independent of A. But that is not true in this case, not according to Israel or anyone else. Israel has never held title, nor even claimed title, to the West Bank or Gaza with the sole possible exception of the 1.2% which East Jerusalem. It is objectively false to claim that the "Palestinian National Authority seceded from Israel". Zerotalk 07:50, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Furthermore, it's your (Neve) interpretation of subentries. I can't find any where in Page or now defunct Wikipedia:WikiProject Leaders by year documentation that says if A is a subentry of B then A is seceding/seceded from B. It's left to the reader to conclude what subentries mean, the core concern raised by this RfC and many participants in this discussion. Compromise section contains some suggestions on how subentry ambiguity can be addressed. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:27, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
More red herring—as far as I am concerned. Readers are not stupid, and you (SE) are grossly underestimating the average intelligence of one. There is (again I must stress) nothing wrong with the status quo, and I will certainly see to it that it will not be changed & thus preventing disruption. De jure recognition is totally irrelevant. The de facto fact of the matter still stands: Palestine seceded in a sense from Israel in 1988, the PNA was formally established from Israel in 1994, and the PNA renamed itself as Palestine in 2013. Again, when shall we be archiving this redundant discussion?--Neve–selbert 16:31, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
@Zero0000 and Spirit Ethanol: I will also have you know that (as a government on its own) it cannot be considered a state on its own as sovereign. It must be connected underneath a sovereign entity (e.g. the Syrian National Coalition or the Islamic Courts Union with Syria and Somalia respectively). Click on the article Palestine and there are four definitions of the word Palestine. Only the fourth applies explicitly to this article. It states the "Palestinian National Authority, also known as the Palestinian Authority, an interim self-government body established in 1994 to govern parts of the territories. Since 2013, the Palestinian National Authority is officially referred to as the State of Palestine by most international organisations." Please remember: when we are referring to Palestine, we are in actual fact referring just to a rebranded Palestinian National Authority. We are not in any way, shape, or form referring to the State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988. This list is only referring to the PNA—whose territory has only mere autonomy from Israeli administration.--Neve–selbert 16:41, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
List should include Palestine, a partially recognized state and UN observer state with international recognition. Sean.hoyland (talk · contribs)'s comments in this discussion full of useful links and pointers on aforementioned point. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 19:06, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Ah, I see you have copied my "respond to red herring" edit summary banter; how cheeky. Look, I think you are resorting WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. FWIW, you should read the footnote. Of course, you would rather shut that and me out completely, as your woeful and disruptive behaviour would suggest—although if I have to bang my head against the table to get the facts across while others also supporting the status quo refuse to get involved, then so be it. I did not, in fact, state any red herrings. We are referring to a government, not a state. No matter whatever your POV is: this is the fact of the matter and you should therefore respect that. The State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988 has been judged as not worthy of inclusion by the local community, only the PNA established in 1994. Stop imposing your POV and listen for once.--Neve–selbert 19:43, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
In otherwords, the Palestinian situation here, is a government without a country. GoodDay (talk) 19:47, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Neve, State of Palestine not worthy of inclusion as judged by local community, according to whom? Kindly provide references. GoodDay, page title is "List of state leaders", for heads of states, not governments... Spirit Ethanol (talk) 19:57, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
As I'm understanding it. There's no state to be the head of. Perhaps, changing these articles entrance criteria to state leaders of sovereign states, would be best. GoodDay (talk) 20:00, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Fine. Start with this one.
Sean.hoyland - talk 20:09, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Wowsers, it's very difficult to argue against the UN. GoodDay (talk) 20:14, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Is it really to difficult to argue with the UN? They have been accused of bias, you know. Abiding by WP:NPOV, we cannot be accused of the same.
@GoodDay: I am not exactly warming to that idea. I believe that restricting this article to sovereign states would deprive this article greatly of justifiable information (and splitting the article would be timewasting and unnecessary; there is already a separate article for dependent leaders anyhow), so I would naturally be opposed to such a compromise / entrance criteria.
@Spirit Ethanol: Your query to GoodDay is irrelevant. It would be an outrage if we excluded the British Prime Minister from this article—yet he is not the head of state of the UK, Her Majesty is. State leaders is a somewhat ambiguous term, perhaps, referring to those identified as leading a state and/or government. Renaming the article as List of state and government leaders in 2016 would be silly, as this would infer that someone such as David Cameron does not lead the UK state and instead the ceremonial HoS does, which is laughable nonsense. Again, I am not 100% certain as to who created or devised this criteria. Please ask either Zoltan Bukovszky or Bogdan Uleia, they may have a more "sufficient" or digestable answer for you.--Neve–selbert 20:22, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Compromise

Ya'll should consider creating two sections for these articles. A sovereign state section & a disputed sovereign state section. The former, would have Canada, United Kingdom, France, Israel etc. The latter would have Palestine, Taiwan, Western Sahara, Kosovo, etc. GoodDay (talk) 17:40, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

Israel with its double-digit lack of recognition? A split is definitely possible, but the criteria you propose do not line up with your examples. CMD (talk) 17:43, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
People here know that "recognition" is not the only and not even the main criteria to being a State, right ? Israel is a State because it has sovereignty . Palestine is not because it has not. Being recognized or not by some countries does not really change anything to it. Benjil (talk) 21:02, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
These words are barely meaningful. If a state is occupied by another, it does not suddenly become not a state. It becomes a state unable to exercise its sovereignty. Some academic experts distinguish between legal sovereignty and practical sovereignty, others reject that distinction. Basically your point of view is your point of view and doesn't match the views of many more expert than you. Zerotalk 22:26, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
First there never was any State of Palestine that Israel then occupied. Then, if a State is entirely occupied by another - well then it can cease to exist. That's what happened to many States in history. Benjil (talk) 09:32, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
You have to show it the other way around. Did Iraq cease to be a state when the USA occupied it? No, it became a state under the belligerent occupation of another state. That is what international law specifies, especially since the UN Charter outlawed acquisition of territory by force. Zerotalk 09:26, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
Iraq existed prior to the US occupation. Palestine never existed and to this day there is no "State of Palestine". Benjil (talk) 13:40, 21 February 2016 (UTC)
This is not a compromise but just a different way to entrench a particular pov. Zerotalk 22:27, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
Jeepers & I thought I had a wonderful idea, here :( GoodDay (talk) 23:52, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
GoodDay - I think that the principle here is an excellent idea. The article should list three sections:
  • Soveriegn states
  • States with limited international recognition
  • Sub-national entities
It also needs a clear rationale for why some sub-national entities should be listed and others shouldn't. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 16:10, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
Yes, this would solve a lot of headaches. GoodDay (talk) 16:21, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
(edit conflict) The idea is superfluous—any sudden headaches being solved would render as nothing more than a Placebo effect.
The clear rationale is the following:
  • In order for an independent state to be in bold it must has 100% de facto control over its territory.
How can one be clearer?--Neve–selbert 16:22, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
For what its worth, I am totally against this compromise as an option.--Neve–selbert 16:34, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
It was the best I & SNC could come up with. Otherwise, it's looking more like the Rfc's going to adopt the proposed change of giving Palestine/PNA its own full entry. GoodDay (talk) 16:37, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
@GoodDay: The Rfc question desperately needs to be halted/aborted—yet I have no authority to make this happen. All of the contributors seem to believe that the status quo is Palestine being its own independent state, and not the other way round. They also seem to believe that we are trying to infer that the PNA is some sort of subnational entity of Israel, which is completely false. This was foul play on Spirit Ethanol's part and I will not let him get away with it. Personally, I doubt that the Rfc will adopt anything. This is such a controversial issue anyway (subject to sanctions, as I have experienced) and as editors we are obliged to WP:NPOV. Therefore, I am confident the status quo will be retained, just as with what happened over here earlier this month.--Neve–selbert 16:48, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
Proposed sectioning above would be great enhancement to page and remove subentry ambiguities. I propose following lead of French counterpart page of this list, pretty close to proposal above by Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk · contribs). Spirit Ethanol (talk) 16:51, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
@Spirit Ethanol: Nope, nay, ixnay. I will not let you destroy the article in question. The French counterpart is beyond atrocious and disgraceful compared to our English example. There will be no change, and I will certainly see to it that there will be no change. You are deliberately disrupting this project to make a point, and I will not let you get away with that. I will seek administrative action if necessary, as your presenting of this Rfc was inexplicably corrupt and crooked. This discussion is worthless, and is a waste of everyones' time.--Neve–selbert 17:04, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

Neve-selbert, 100% de facto control as an independent state in bold is indeed a clear rationale, however it is not what this article is using. Such a definition means that you define China, Ukraine, Suriname, Somalia, Venezuela, Comoros, Azerbaijan, Sudan, and many many others as non-independent states. It would also define Abkhazia, Kosovo, and some others currently not bolded as bolded independent states. If this rationale is indeed what is being used, then it is applied woefully inconsistently. CMD (talk) 16:56, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

@Chipmunkdavis: I did not mean to infer overlapping territory. That rationale was my idea of what was being used—although I think that saying that it is being applied woefully inconsistently is a bit of a stretch. Most sources describe Taiwan as a sovereign state, unlike Abkhazia and Kosovo (described as disputed areas far more frequently). So per WP:WEIGHT, there really is no problem, and so we should all be getting on with more important things.--Neve–selbert 17:04, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
The list as formatted at the moment implies that the entities such as Palestine and Nagorno-Karabakh, which are listed with indented bullet-points underneath the entry for the recognized/land controlling state, are somehow subdivisions, sub-states or administrative entities that form part of the main entry. There are other ways we could do this - for example, upgrading non-recognised/limited-recognized states to the same textual level as recongized states but still avoiding bold font. My view would be that extracting them may be better, but I can see the advantage to the reader of the current geographically-based list. FWIW, I don't think we need huge changes here: just a way of better differentiating between sub-national administrative entities and entities which claim sovereignty; and a clear rationale for the presence of sub-national entities (why Guernsey and not Greenland?)Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 18:33, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
The list as formatted at the moment implies that the entities such as Palestine and Nagorno-Karabakh, which are listed with indented bullet-points underneath the entry for the recognized/land controlling state, are somehow subdivisions, sub-states or administrative entities that form part of the main entry.
No, this is quite simply an inaccurate assessment and just goes to show some lack of enlightenment on this issue in particular, so I will attempt to explain briefly what this entails.
Please note that to the right of the disputed entities, there is in parenthesis a general description of their status as a state alongside their international recognition, e.g. for Abkhazia we have: (unrecognised, secessionist state). Now, where did Abkhazia secede from? Switzerland? Of course not, Abkhazia seceded from Georgia back in 1992 (a secession unrecognised by most of the international community) and to make this clear it only makes sense for us use to include Abkhazia jointly underneath Georgia, mainly for historical record—almost its parent state, in a sense.
Why Guernsey and not Greenland?
Guernsey is not an integral part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, whereas Greenland is an integral part of the Kingdom of Denmark. Simple as, really.
IMO, we are probably in need to revive the defunct WikiProject Leaders by year in order to avoid misunderstandings such as these.
Specifically, Super Nintendo Chalmers, I would refer to section 8.2, for more information.--Neve–selbert 02:19, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
This is possible. A few years ago, a bunch of List of countries articles had to be changed to List of sovereign state articles, to end disputes over including/excluding England, Wales, Scotland & Northern Ireland. GoodDay (talk) 02:25, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Indeed, and that was a decision that has definitely paid off in that those discussions stopped happening after that point.
Two notes on above: Abkhazia declared independence in 1999 but backdated it to 1992, and while Guernsey is not integrated into the UK, all the Dutch and French territories are considered integral parts of their states, yet appear on this list. CMD (talk) 03:17, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
OK; we are at least getting somewhere - you've revealed your criteria! So sub-national entities which are listed here are those which are not integral part of a sovereign state. Great. The first thing that we need to do then is to get the page to say this, and to clarify some of the cases raised by CMD and others above. The information needs to be on this page ; it can't be hidden on some Wikiproject. Look at List of best-selling music artists or List of sovereign states - both give the reader clear information on the criteria and design of the list. This page needs something similar (at very very least in a footnote).
Then we have the 'parent' state issue. I don't think it's correct to list 'Abkazhia' as a division under Georgia (or Palestine under Israel, etc. etc.). There is an implication that the secessionist state is an administrative division of Georgia. BTW, I think that the following change would probably suffice, for me at least:

Becomes

The 'disputed with' could be edited to 'generally recongized as part of' or some such? I was a little harsh above claiming that the page is woefully flawed, but I don't see what harm this sort of clarification would do. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:25, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
If we go with this, I'd change the wording from "disputed with" to something along the lines of "secessionist area of". "disputed with" to me implies reasonably equal entities, which these are definitely not. As an aside this is probably not the best example, as Puntland is completely out of place on this list and should probably be removed completely. CMD (talk) 10:20, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
no Unnecessary and completely oppose. There really is no need. We are not listing Abkhazia, Palestine, etc. as "divisions" or "subdivisions" under Georgia and/or Israel, etc.—this is another key red herring and is totally false and misleading. They are listed underneath those sovereign entities due to the fact that they were previously integrated with them, and also because they are both within the same continent. Overseas collectivites are not considered part of the French Republic (only the overseas departments are). The Dutch issue is quite different, the Prime Minister of the Netherlands is the prime minister of the constituent Netherlands country only & not the entirety of the kingdom on par with the UK—so the state leaders of the other constitutent countries are necessary for inclusion also. Moreover, I must stress further that any superfluous changes will just further complicate matters in the future, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the status quo as it is. For me, the real issue is to get the related WikiProject up and running again; the information does not need to clog up this page, and it would be perfectly fine included in the associated WikiProject. This is what we should be focusing on doing—as there is a strong chance that reviving the WP will significantly aid in avoiding similar misunderstandings in future.--Neve–selbert 14:56, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
OK, then we disagree. Fundamentally - it looks like secessionist or limited-recognized states are being listed as sub-entities of other states (though I anticipate that that is not the intention). With regards to sub-entities - I still don't understand the rationale for the inclusion of different leaders. Is this page meant to be a list of heads of state? Or heads of government? OK, I think I see - so it's heads of state and heads of government, such that the highest level of governor of all territories in the world are somehow covered? In which case it's nothing about being an integral part of the state, and more about the role of heads of government? Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 21:38, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Most dependent territories are different in certain aspects, so it depends on which of those you are referring to. For example, neither Scotland, Mayotte or Hawaii qualify for inclusion on this list due to the established fact that they are directly under the governance (either federal or devolved, etc.) of the United Kingdom, France, and the United States respectively. On the contrary, the Cayman Islands, Saint Martin, and the Northern Mariana Islands do qualify, as they are not directly governed by their sovereign state as an integral part of that sovereign state—although not exactly as a colony, as is evident through their degree of autonomy. So, all in all, leaders of dependent territories not considered as an integral part of the state having sovereignty over it are indeed qualified for inclusion—as they represent their state not as an internal part of the administering nation, but as an external part of it.
  • On the issue of your question, I would note that on the article Kingdom of the Netherlands, all five leaders are mentioned in the Government part of the infobox:
  1. Monarch
  2. Chairman of the Council of Ministers
  3. Minister Plenipotentiary of Aruba
  4. Minister Plenipotentiary of Curaçao
  5. Minister Plenipotentiary of Sint Maarten
I must admit that the issues involving the SLBY articles have the potential to be quite complicated. IMO, if we try to adjust one thing there will certainly be some kind of Domino effect, so instead of thinking of ways of how to change the article as it stands around now, we should be thinking of ways in clarifying what needs to be clarified in order to prevent similar misunderstandings and confusions such as these whenever in future.--Neve–selbert 22:26, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
<reduce indent> I don't really see how what other Wikipedia pages do can act as proper criteria for this article, though I recognize the point that you're making. I still don't really see how the status of Greenland/Faroe Islands is any more integral into Denmark than Aruba etc are in the Netherlands (indeed as I understand it, the latter are part of the EU, while the former are not). I don't think that there is a basis for their different listing here other than "we list them differently".
I appreciate the issues with complexity too, but I also don't quite see it as a reason for accepting a list that doesn't make its own terms clear. It's not actually asking anything new; it's asking for at most a paragraph to describe what the list is doing - which as I understand it is: listing heads of state; heads of government of sovereign states; heads of government of de jure independent states; and heads of government of dependent territories which are 'independently governed', in which 'independently governed' means that that territory's government is fully independent of the central sovereign state government. The final point, I agree, is complex and I may not have quite understood, but this is only because the page has not defined its terms.
Beyond this, I still agree with the original point of the RFC - the listing of Palestine and others is misleading. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 22:41, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Every country treats its distant territories in different ways, but as far as I'm aware Greenland and the Faroes could arguably be considered more integrated than others because each sends representatives to the Danish parliament, whereas as far as I know the Dutch countries are not represented in the primary Netherlands parliament. That said, I wouldn't use that as a reason to present this list as is. At any rate, Neve-Selbert is incorrect that only the overseas departments are considered integral parts of France. The French constitution lists all their territories, and like the Danish territories the French territories are represented in the French parliament. CMD (talk) 23:03, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
So now, twofold, here I go again:
  1. The original point of the Rfc is redundant. Their listings are not misleading in any way. I understand them perfectly. I cannot comprehend this argument.
  2. Wikipedia:WikiProject Leaders by year is the best "guide of some sorts" that I could find. Although, notably, one particular section is empty.
You can make of the second point what you will (of course). So, to close up, I still firmly believe the article should stay as is.
Nobody had a problem with the layout before 9 February, with everything being smooth sailing—until that POV torpedo hit.--Neve–selbert 23:17, 15 February 2016 (UTC)
Discussion so far has produced many concerns about current layout that need to be addressed. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 08:46, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
<reduce indent> OK; we're not really progressing much further with this debate. How much longer does the RfC last for? We can hold for or invite further comments, we could summarize where we're at, or we could move to some sort of dispute resolution? Perhaps holding for a week and seeing who else drops by and what less frequent contributors have to add might be a good idea - it would also allow currently interested parties to reflect further on the points made. We could then summarize and move forward? Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:12, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
So far consensus is placing Palestine as a standalone entry in alphabetical order. Please see Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment#Ending_RfCs for duration and how to request closure of an RfC. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 09:37, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
It's highly disingenuous to make that claim at this stage. We need to properly consider the arguments made, summarize them, and look at how to move forward. We also may need an independent admin/reviewer to look at the case. There is no rush here and decisions need to be made properly, and if there is no agreement then we need to keep discussing. Consensus is based on agreement, not on majority vote, weight, or rushing things through. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:54, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
I concur that this discussion needs to be closed by an independent admin/reviewer once topic of RfC thoroughly discussed, arguments summarized. Outcome affects not only this page, but also many other pages (previous list of state leaders pages, list of foreign ministers, etc...). Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:16, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
I have asked Newyorkbrad to review this questionable case. Nonetheless, the fact that no two-state solution has been agreed upon yet must be relevant—somehow? How could it not be? Or will we attempt to breach WP:NPOV and live in a fantasy world where Palestine is its own sovereign nation in its own right without any foreign occupational interference whatsoever? Say what you will about Taiwan, although China has as much power over it as Spain and Argentina have over Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands respectively. The Rfc question is ambiguous, biased, and blatantly inaccurate. Furthermore, this has been a redundant discussion and a redundant Rfc. The only reason why we are here today discussing away is due to the fact that some editor happened to be upset at the reality that Palestine is occupied by Israel, and wanted to whitewash this patent truth by pretending that Palestine is a sovereign state in every way due to the (70%?) international recognition it has got over the years back. This was an irrelevant justification. The fact of the matter still stands: Palestine is not fully sovereign and is not fully independent of Israeli interference, i.e. the occupied territories. Any attempt to dismiss otherwise borders on WP:FRINGE and is flagrant propaganda. For the hundredth time, the list does not in any way, shape, or form infer that Palestine is some sort of substate of Israel. If it were, why would six administrative districts including the Tel Aviv District be excluded? Those are the sub-states. Palestine is directly underneath the Israeli entry due to both the downright lack of de facto sovereignty and the de facto fact of the occupation on the part of Israel. This whole debate has been all without substance; of course, there are some people that are genuinely upset at the lack of Palestinian sovereignty—just as there are people that are upset that the Falklands are not part of Argentina & the Crimea no longer being part of the Ukraine, etc. The entirety of the premise of layout change is unashamedly a form of WP:JUSTDONTLIKEIT. There is no genuine problem on the article, the end of the world will not occur in the event we conclude there is no genuine consensus for change of some sort, we are not misleading editors or readers (as most editors and readers alike are aware of the Palestinian situation; in fact, we would probably astound them if we listed Palestine as its own separate sovereign nation—they would be misled to believe that peace between the two nations has finally been agreed). All that said, I will state that this misunderstanding is partly due to a lack of enlightenment over how the SLBY articles' mechanisms work (and although I would refrain from calling myself an expert on the layout, I do know my fair share insofar to get by). I realise and concede that the layout may be confusing for some—and perhaps it would be wise to make the rules of the layout clear on the associated (albeit defunct) WikiProject page. To conclude, I must reiterate that this layout has worked well for well over three years and I honestly see no concrete, credible reason to change the format now. Nothing politically has really changed or transformed in the West Bank for us to go to the lengths of displaying Palestine as its own seperate sovereign entity. Palestine and Israel are closely affiliated, there can be no doubt (with the latter occupying the former). The layout as it stands now makes sense, and I plan to defend it all the way.--Neve–selbert 16:06, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
Nowhere in article do I see mentioned that subentries lack de facto sovereignty which is a source of ambiguity and can imply many things. Take a look at List of current heads of state and government for an example of a properly done list where difference between de facto and de jure is expressed in colors. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 17:22, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
A properly done list? The irony. What part of Member and observer states of the United Nations is ambiguous to you?--Neve–selbert 17:30, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
This does not explain subentries, which can imply many things.... Spirit Ethanol (talk) 17:33, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
Again, red herring. You are adamant in making a mountain out of a molehill at every turn. Read WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT.--Neve–selbert 17:38, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
Wait, what? There's an article called List of current heads of state and government? Then why does List of state leaders in 2016 even exist? The articles are the same thing!! Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 23:16, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

I can think of only one other idea. Split up the articles into List of (sovereign) state leaders in Year & List of (non-sovereign) state leaders in Year. Any future disputes would be simplified to keep/delete this entry or that entry. PS: This is my last offer of a compromise, assuming this Rfc's results are judged valid. If this Rfc is judge invalid? then naturally, a new Rfc will be opened -- hopefully in a more central place, as it would effect multiple articles. GoodDay (talk) 17:59, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

@GoodDay: Touching wood, the Rfc will be judged as invalid, and no compromise will be necessary. In which case, the discussion will need to travel to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Leaders by year.--Neve–selbert 18:08, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
Such a split doesn't address the problems brought up in this RfC, which turn around what makes a state sovereign or not. The second list doesn't seem very useful at any rate, both due to the immense variety that would cover as well as the fact that explicitly non-sovereign states are mostly excluded from this page as it stands. CMD (talk) 18:16, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
@Chipmunkdavis: I would say that I am inclined to agree, CND. Also, this discussion should be moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Leaders by year.--Neve–selbert 18:21, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Rfc reboot?

Concerns have been raised that this RFC's been started in a biased fashion. To remove any doubts about this Rfc? I wouldn't object to an administrator shutting it down & starting up a new one. GoodDay (talk) 16:12, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

I'd be fine with that, though if Newyorkbrad is going to review this discussion first perhaps we can wait on that. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 16:30, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
OK, I see the that NYB has decided to not intervene - so I'll request closure of this RfC unless anyone objects? --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:18, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
I would be more than happy in closing this Rfc, per lack of consensus between parties on change.--Neve–selbert 17:07, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
It is up to closing admin to assess consensus, which is so far on placing Palestine in a separate entry. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 17:18, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
Let's allow the closing administrator to decide what the consensus is, if there is any :) GoodDay (talk) 17:24, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

In my opinion the RfC question is seriously flawed and misleadingly in a way that can easily be seen as offensive. The current setup does not indicate that Palestine is a "sub state" of Israel (which neither corresponds to the facts, nor is claimed - as much as I know - even by Israel). What the current format indicates is that the internal and external circumstances of sovereign statehood (internal control and external recognition) are not wholly present. Palestine has a number of recognitions, but certainly no sovereign control over the territory. And it is for similar reasons that the likes of Abkhazia are also under the state to which they are most closely linked one way or another (either being occupied by it, or their territory being claimed in its entirety by the other, etc). So re-phrasing the question could well be crucial for a fair and balanced discussion where debaters could concentrate on what is, rather than what should be. ZBukov (talk) 18:38, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
The current format is ambiguous and it is left to the reader to interpret what a sub-entry implies. RfC question is clear on whether to include Palestine in a standalone manner or a subentry to Israel as evident by almost unanimous response to include Palestine in a standalone manner. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 18:51, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
We assume that when an administrator checks over this Rfc, he/she will also determine if the Rfc is flawed or not. Let's be patient. GoodDay (talk) 19:14, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
<reduced indent> OK, I've listed it, including a note that some editors have questioned the phrasing of the RfC. Agree that we need some patience here - there could be a wait for closure. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 21:21, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
I find it funny how Spirit Ethanol finds my attitude (and ZBukov's) towards this misunderstanding as "intransigent". I am merely trying to maintain the status quo which has worked for many years—for all practical purposes you border WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT at every turn. There is nothing misleading about how the article is currently formatted, it is clear and concise and if you cannot cope with that then you really should just move on to something else. Administrator Alison has also been notified by GoodDay to assess this dispute, so there could be several admins attempting to make some assessment of this. All in all, I remain confident that the status quo will be retained due to lack of concrete consensus on an alternative.--Neve–selbert 21:42, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
Oh I agree that Barnstar (/all Barnstars - we are not 10 year olds looking for stickers) is stupid and miss characterizes your edits Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 23:28, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Merge

OK, it's just been brought to my attention that we have an identical article titled List of current heads of state and government. Either that page or this page need not exist. This whole thing is a farce. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 23:18, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

This article exists, because it's part of a series of articles. GoodDay (talk) 23:20, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
Is that not bit recursive? OK, I admit the merge thing was provocative - ignore it, I see that we will want this article in 11 months time, so why not work on it now - but surely will can agree that we need to fix that this article and 'current sate leaders'list entities differently? Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 23:31, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
How do you propose to differentiate them? GoodDay (talk) 23:35, 18 February 2016 (UTC)
I can see some justification in this page as it would track any changes that occurred during this year, whereas in List of current heads of state and government only the current one would be shown. A lot of overlap, but it works itself out over 12 months.
I on the other hand agree that it would be convenient for the reader to have this page formatted reasonably similarly to the List of current heads of state and government. There is an issue in that the division done in that article would become less workable as you go back in time, but I suppose that would be the same with any system, and it can change flexibly among these articles. CMD (talk) 03:05, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
To be frank, this is a stupid & rash "idea", and makes zero sense whatsoever (even those whom are sectioned would know the fundamental difference between the two articles). As the old saying goes, if it ain't broke, don't fix it (per WP:BROKE). These SLBY articles have worked fine for years, and I oppose any attempts in changing the minimalist design of the article in the question—of which there is absolutely no problem with whatsoever. This article is fine & the series of which the article is part are fine (and I have continually made sure of that over the past 6 months, strenuous proofreading and all). To quote everyone's favourite bard, this is all much ado about nothing, all caused by a disruptive POV, pro-Palestine campaigner.--Neve–selbert 06:52, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
CMD is of course correct that the two pages would be idenitcal on 1st Jan 2016, but differ slowly over the year - I do see that, and that that would be a reason for holding two articles - as I noted, my merge suggestion was not a serious one, but more of a way of raising the question of why the formats differ. This reinforces in me a sense that we do have a problem - how can we claim to be producing a coherent encyclopedia when we list the same entities, existing simultaneously, along different criteria in different orders on different pages. To me, that seems broken. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:20, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
One further note - the table format on the page is superior to the layout here. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:22, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
One further note - the table format on the page is superior to the layout here.
I could not disagree more fervently and emphatically.
I am completely at loggerheads with the above statement, almost offended. Your personal opinion on this article is as flawed as can be, and having spent hours and hours on end proofreading this article and 15 others (and counting) over the past 6 months—yes, may I indeed say, that I do feel offended by your gross lack of respect and enigmatic vitriol. It is honestly about time this wasteful dispute is reviewed and ended for good (again, all because one editor was emotionally upset over how Palestine was displayed). The quasi-perfect status quo will be retained, I am quite sure and confident of that. I look forward to this talk page being archived in due time (and the clock is ticking for that).--Neve–selbert 16:14, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
You are of course correct to point out that I should have said that I prefer it, rather than it is better; those are different statements and I used the wrong one - for that I apologise. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 16:33, 19 February 2016 (UTC)
OK, I accept that.--Neve–selbert 16:57, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Survey Clarification

Shall we keep the status quo or adopt the proposed change?
May we please have input here. I'm not trying to de-legitimize the above survey. Just trying to get clarity. PS- I won't protest if this request is ignored. GoodDay (talk) 17:30, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

  • Status quo, as there really is nothing wrong with it; two-state solution non-existent; the PNA is not a state but a government, originally governed by Israel.--Neve–selbert 17:38, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment: I don't understand the question. Palestine has been put under Israel, which is wrong as Palestine is recognized as a state by United Nations. It should be put in the list at the same level, back to the original version of the article. Wykx (talk) 19:55, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
You'd then be in favour of the proposed change. GoodDay (talk) 20:05, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
I would recommend to use the same breakdown/criteria for inclusion as for List_of_sovereign_states. Wykx (talk) 20:22, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
@Wykx: The UN recognises Palestine as an observer state, not as a member state on par with Israel, Jordan, etc. Besides, the United Nations has also been accused of bias in the past, so to take the word of the UN as gospel would be to overlook WP:NPOV. Furthermore, we are not referring to the State of Palestine of 1988, but rather the Palestinian National Authority created in 1994. The PNA rebranded itself at the UN as simply Palestine in 2013. Again, no two-state solution has been agreed and Israel still occupies parts of the territory claimed, governed by the PNA; hence it being underneath the Israeli entry.--Neve–selbert 20:35, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
Does it mean that we have to remove Holy See which is also an observer state? No. An observer state is recognized as such. What better NPOV do you propose aside from UN? I can't see. And the state is partially occupied, but it is the case in Ukraine, Georgia, etc and we don't remove these states. Wykx (talk) 20:45, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
@Wykx: Ah, but the Holy See is notably different and distinct from that of Vatican City. I must state that the Holy See is treated in almost the exact same way as the PNA (aka Palestine) is, underneath the Vatican and Israel respectively. What better NPOV? It depends. Some argue that Palestine just is not fully sovereign, and some Palestinians would agree on that. They have not yet achieved their aim of full independence of Israeli domestic interference (unlike Taiwan: free from Chinese domestic interference). One just has to ask those living in the West Bank. On the subject of Ukraine and Georgia, it is quite different. The seat of their government remains intact, Kiev and Tbilisi respectively. The same just cannot be said of Palestine and Israel, as Jersualem is disputed between both equally per international law. Israel receives the most recognition, so therefore it should be Israel recognised on top as sovereign in bold, and Palestine underneath (underlining their close connection to one another). Israel is recognised by 157 nations, Palestine is recognised by 136. If Palestine catches up and ties with Israel, or even exceeds Israel's recognition, then I will certainly support the consideration of the PNA (or even Palestine) being listed separately. But until this eventually occurs, we should keep the status quo until something really changes on the ground at that disputed area (most likely scenario being an increase of Palestinian recognition versus that of Israeli). So, if Palestine is recognised by 21 more nations in the future? We should certainly reopen this discussion and start considering a change to the status quo. That would be my position.--Neve–selbert 21:57, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

The Holy See is the office of the Papacy who is the sovereign of the State of the Vatican City. The Holy See is to the State of the Vatican City like the Queen of the UK or the Court of St. James is to the United Kingdom. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 17:28, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

And if Palestine gets recognized by more than 157, should we put Israel as a sub-entry to Palestine. Your criteria for sub-entries and whether to include State of Palestine or PNA is Wikipedia:Original research. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 05:53, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
I very much call into question whether or not you actually are aware of the ins and outs of WP:OR. Anywho, the system of government in Palestine is markedly and extraordinarily different from that of Israel, despite seeming similarities at the outset. Bear in mind, we must be referring to a rebranded Palestinian National Authority (of 1994, renamed 2013) and not the State of Palestine (of 1988). Furthermore, Israel received the most sovereignty first between the two states, so it would be outrageous to reverse their roles once Palestine receives sufficient recognition. There is no two-state solution, and your attempts to whitewash this patent fact is a refusal to adhere to WP:FRINGE.--Neve–selbert 07:05, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
"I must state that the Holy See is treated in almost the exact same way as the PNA (aka Palestine) is, underneath the Vatican and Israel respectively. What better NPOV?" That's an argument against the status quo. There isn't the least, tiniest, most minute, infinitesimal similarity between the Vatican City/Holy City relationship and the Israel/Palestine relationship. Treating them the same despite them not being the same is just bad editing. Zerotalk 09:24, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
Nope, I would render it as superb editing. I have never stated that the relationship between the Vatican City and Holy See is exactly the same as the one between Palestine (PNA) and Israel. What a red herring. I just stated that there were similarities, e.g. both the Holy See and the Palestinian National Authority are treated as separate and independent de jure sovereign governments by the majority of the international community (albeit underneath the Vatican and Israel respectively due partly to both the history and the evident synergy—good or bad—involved between them both).--Neve–selbert 17:18, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Trout the editors who think Palestine is a sub-state of Israel Even the mob of anti-Palestine editors shouldn't care to see something as nonsensical as this form of Palestine delegitimization go through. Sepsis II (talk) 02:25, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
    "Substate of Israel?" I agree. What does this nonsense even mean? Who on earth infers that Palestine is a substate of Israel? Certainly not me.--Neve–selbert 03:35, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
The "status quo" text that you support so diligently says that Palestine is not a state at all. But the lesson you should learn is that yet one more visitor has interpreted the indentation differently from how you claim to interpret it. But of course that couldn't possibly be because it is misleading. Zerotalk 09:24, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
Simply a POV of yet another editor. There is practically nothing "misleading" with the status quo; it is only misleading if one wants it to be so.--Neve–selbert 17:23, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
  • I'm against further discussion while we wait and admin to review and close the existing RfC. If they deem the question was misleading then we can work on rephrasing it. If they deem it fine, then hopefully we can suggest ways of moving forward. I suggest that until such time, any discussion is a waste of most of our time. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:43, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
The RfC question has been reviewed, and deemed neither misleading nor biased. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 16:48, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
The user Aervanath simply skimmed through the discussion, and did not read all of it. I replied to him for the third time, and there was no further answer from him. Users GoodDay, Zoltan Bukovszky, and even Robert McClenon have expressed concern over the wording of the Rfc. Nobody is suggesting that Palestine is a substate of Israel. Literally, nobody. If I may say so, one would have to be as blind as a bat not to judge the Rfc question as overwhelmingly misleading & biased.--Neve–selbert 17:18, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
What does it mean for a state to be a subentry of another? It is left to the reader to infer what that means. Many participants in this RfC have raised concerns that current layout is ambiguous and misleading. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 17:28, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
Ask ZB, I have already made my case for the current layout—a layout only ambiguous and misleading for those wanting it to be so to advance their PoV cause. For me, and for many others over the past few years, have had zero problems with the layout and are content with the way the article stands as of now. Of course, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is not a pretty one, and we are bound to upset a few people. But we must accept fact. If I were to be completely on the side of Israel (as a diehard Zionist, etc.), I would vehemently oppose Palestine's inclusion on this list. But I am trying to take the centrist position: include the Palestinian Authority, but don't include them as fully sovereign on par with other surrounding Middle Eastern nations.--Neve–selbert 17:37, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
It's not up to you as an editor to subjectively choose inclusion criteria, layout, or whether state of Palestine is recognized or not. Page should conform to to other wikipedia pages (e.g. List of sovereign states, List of current heads of state and government) and reliable sources (PNA vs State of Palestine, subentry format, ....). Current layout is a deviation with a finite lifespan. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 19:43, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
Well. Now, since when have I ever stated that it was simply up to me (as an editor) to "subjectively choose inclusion criteria, layout, or whether state of Palestine is recognized or not?" Never. A straw-man argument on your own part. I just happened to give the impression that it was my idea of the layout—although I was not 100% certain. Furthermore, why don't you ask either Zoltan Bukovszky or Bogdan Uleia for an explanation? Or is this part of your sideling strategy? Secondly, on the question as to whether the current layout is "a deviation with a finite lifespan"? In your opinion, perhaps it is. Besides, I made clear earlier on that the current layout is not likely to be permanent forever. Just for the time being it is apt. So, yet again for the umpteenth time, you are deliberately disrupting Wikipedia to make a point. Your deviance should be subject to arbitration enforcement.--Neve–selbert 20:13, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
I would also refer you to WP:WINARS.--Neve–selbert 20:15, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
@Spirit Ethanol:, for the record, I did not say that the question was or wasn't biased; I haven't made a judgment on that. What I said was that the contributors to the RfC had mostly not been influenced by any bias in the question. That is not the same thing as there being no bias. @Neve-selbert:, please don't refer to your fellow editors as blind bats, even by implication. It is possible to have a difference of opinion without being insulting.--Aervanath (talk) 12:17, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

I reckon we're just gonna have to sit back & let this Rfc runs its course. We'll know what happens in March, when the dust settles :) GoodDay (talk) 20:30, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

@GoodDay: We should try our best to avoid BLUDGEONing also. I have a feeling that when the Rfc expires, another will just have to be opened for further clarification. Also, we need input from both ZB and BU—they are both more experienced with the layout than I am; they also indirectly support the status quo (having thanked my edits). This is all a big misunderstanding, I reckon. Everyone out there is getting all hot and bothered over Palestine (or rather the Palestinian Authority) being rendered as a sub-state of Israel, despite the fact this claim has been debunked time and time again. It remains one of the primary aims of SE to perpetuate this claim to his advantage—some funny business he should not be allowed to get away with.--Neve–selbert 21:04, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

It's not a big misunderstanding. It's about fixing mistakes.

  • The hierarchical structure can suggest Palestine is a sub-state of Israel. We know this to be the case because a person wrote "Should Palestine be included as a stand alone state or a sub state of Israel". This is something we know from this statement and statements by other editors, so it is a useful thing, something we know to be true. Since we know that the hierarchical structure can cause people to think that Wikipedia is treating Palestine as a sub-state of Israel, the reasonable thing to do would be to address that problem. To deny that there is a problem despite the evidence to the contrary and write statements like "a layout only ambiguous and misleading for those wanting it to be so to advance their PoV cause" is not reasonable. To say that it is just Spirit Ethanol is not true. To say that this is about a "PoV cause" demonstrates a willful blindness to evidence, to the actual state of affairs according to published reliable sources, an editor's only legitimate source of information here.

  • It is easy to understand why an editor who understands policy and has examined the evidence in RS is likely to favor change over the status quo without having to imagine a "PoV cause". The first step is realizing that a statement like "Bear in mind, we must be referring to a rebranded Palestinian National Authority (of 1994, renamed 2013) and not the State of Palestine (of 1988)" is a patently false premise and understanding that the footnote that forms part of the status quo is an WP:OR violation that started here in List of state leaders in 2013, as the personal opinion of an editor that has been carried forward ever since when it should have been deleted. The next step is understanding that this and related articles are called 'List of state leaders in <year>' and that they are about states and the leaders of those states. The Palestinian National Authority is not a monotreme and it is not a marsupial, and that is probably why it is not included in Wikipedia's List of monotremes and marsupials. It is not a state either. There's an infinite set of things that the PNA is not, none of which need to concern us.

It is the RS evidence, evidence that many informed editors are already familiar with, that explains why editors who are here to build an encyclopedia based on Wikipedia's rules can favor change over the status quo. It has nothing to do with POV. It is a consequence of looking at evidence in the context of Wikipedia's policies. It is no surprise that an editor with an indifference to RS based evidence and a preference for their own personal opinions and imagined realities would favor the status quo. Sean.hoyland - talk 09:06, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

What I find important about this issue is that the difference between Palestine and fully independent, sovereign countries should be indicated. I do not want to deny Palestine her sovereignty, but we should indicate the fact that unfortunately Palestine de facto is not independent (no matter how many states give her diplomatic recognition), because the country is occupied and is under the military administration of another state (therefore she has no ultimate control over her territory and population - and that has been the case since the State of Palestine was declared). So we should find an appropriate and consistent way to indicate that Palestine's statehood is problematic in this way. This is the same reason why Kosovo appears "under" Serbia (i.e. that the internal and external attributes of state sovereignty are not wholly present). That is not meant to indicate that Kosovo is regarded as a sub-state of Serbia, but that Kosovo has been seceding from Serbia and the process has not ended yet (though in that case it's rather the external aspects of sovereignty which are still problematic). ZBukov (talk) 15:06, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
My points exactly, Zoltan. I concur.--Neve–selbert 16:36, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
An efficient, unambiguous and standard way to inform readers about attributes of states that are regarded as significant enough to be included in articles is to use reliably sourced language to describe those attributes. That is how reliable sources do it. ISO simply use an Independent Yes/No attribute for example. It's true that Palestine is not independant, that it is under Israeli occupation, that it is a partially recognized state and it's true that Israel is independant, that it does not have sovereignty over the parts of Palestine and Syria it occupies and that it is a partially recognized state. Language can convey information like this efficiently and unambiguously if it is deemed notable enough for inclusion whereas it's clear that hierarchical structures cannot, at least not in the case of Israel and Palestine. The focus should be on effect rather than intent because this is an encyclopedia. Sean.hoyland - talk 17:10, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
The status quo is fine. The lack of a clear alternative is obvious. Going through your points: if Palestine is not independent, then why should we display it independently? If Palestine is under Israeli occupation, then what could possibly be wrong in displaying it underneath the Israeli entry? De facto sovereignty has the upper hand to de jure sovereignty in this list (as per China vs. Taiwan), and it is quite clear that treating Palestine in the same way that we treat Israel is a woeful stretch of WP:WEIGHT and WP:NPOV. Moreover, the Palestinian National Authority is not simply just a government, it is much more than that—it is practically the essence of the Palestinian state itself, containing both Mahmoud Abbas and Rami Hamdallah. The same cannot be said of the Israeli government, containing just Netanyahu. I would also note that on the articles of both Abbas and Hamdallah, the infobox contains respectively the titles of President of the Palestinian National Authority and Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority instead rather of President of Palestine and Prime Minister of Palestine. The rule of thumb with the article-in-question is that we refrain from listing governments (secessionist, et al) separately—as this is a list of state leaders, they must be connected to a state somehow or otherwise be excluded entirely. Palestine is not fully independent from Israel yet—a fact that we must accept and respect.--Neve–selbert 21:23, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
  • The question "if Palestine is not independent, then why should we display it independently?" is the wrong question. The question should be, "Given that RS like ISO, the UN and many other sources treat the State of Palestine as a separate entity from the State of Israel, and given that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia that must reflect RS, and given that the effect of the hierarchical structure is inconsistent with its intent, why should Wikipedia treat it differently?" And the answer is that it should not. Or an even better question might be "Given what is known from the evidence, policy and the effect of the status quo, what can be done to improve things?"
  • Your blogging here based on what you think you know, reasoning from first principals and so called rules of thumb do not have any value. It is not how content decision are supposed to be made and it has produced results that are inconsistent with RS and policy and lead to ambiguity and confusion. No purpose is served by personal opinions like "Palestinian National Authority...is practically the essence of the Palestinian state itself". It wastes everyone's time. Go back to the evidence.
  • You write "the articles of both Abbas and Hamdallah, the infobox contains respectively the titles of President of the Palestinian National Authority and Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority instead rather of President of Palestine and Prime Minister of Palestine" but you are wrong on several counts. Setting aside a bad habit of using Wikipedia as a source, the Mahmoud Abbas article includes the reliably sourced fact that he is the President of the State of Palestine in both the article and the infobox. There are many RS that say this too and it is the RS that matter, not the Wikipedia article. So now you know that you are not paying attention and that treating your own judgement as reliable is error prone. Secondly, the conclusion you draw from the Rami Hamdallah article is the wrong one. What you have there is an opportunity to improve Wikipedia rather than opportunity to use the absence of evidence as something upon which to base an argument. There are plenty of reliable sources that you can find easily and cite for the fact that Rami Hamdallah is the Prime Minister of the State of Palestine e.g. the mission's UN site, UN news or his official profile. You can add the information to his article and re-evaluate your approach to decision making. Sean.hoyland - talk 09:43, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
    I remain unconvinced by your arguments. Despite the fact that I am by no means an expert on the Israel-Palestine issue, the view that I commonly share with others is that one state is more sovereign than the other. You mention the United Nations. Palestine is not a member state, but an observer state (under Israeli occupation). So firstly: per WP:WEIGHT, do most sources recognise the State of Palestine as a sovereign state on par with Canada, Jamaica, the United States, France, etc.? Nope, and I can come up with a whole barrage of references if you wanted me to. And secondly, does a two-state solution even exist for crying out loud? No, not yet anyway. Moreover, I would also refer you to Zoltan's elucidating points above (e.g. here). FWIW, I must persist that Israel & Palestine should and must be listed together, with Israel above for obvious reasons (e.g. as the State receives the most international recognition and controls the majority of territory between the two). Conclusively, I believe that the best way of resolving this misunderstanding is to clarify the accompanying footnote, with further clarification for readers and editors alike on the issue-at-hand. That would be the only possible compromise most of us could possibly agree and give way on—thus a change however slight to the status quo.--Neve–selbert 10:39, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
It's not up to you as an editor to decide whether to include PNA or State of Palestine. You need to provide many reliable sources that list PNA instead of State of Palestine. This is not the case for many (most) pages across wikipedia. To list some:
Did you read Sean.hoyland's responses? Spirit Ethanol (talk) 22:28, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
Your ignorance on the way this article is formatted is astounding. The local community decided to include the PNA rather than the State of Palestine due to the reasons specified in the footnote. Per State of Palestine, most of the areas claimed by the State of Palestine have been occupied by Israel since 1967 in the aftermath of the Six-Day War. Notice most of and not some of. Try comparing this to the island of Taiwan, for example, where the opposite remains the case. By the way, did you read Zoltan's responses?--Neve–selbert 22:55, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
@Zoltan Bukovszky: The way to satisfy your criterion "the difference between Palestine and fully independent, sovereign countries" is to list Palestine with an explanatory comment beside it. I would agree to "partially recognised state under Israeli occupation", which is perfectly true and answers practically all objections. The name should of course be "Palestine" which is what it calls itself and what the UN calls it. Zerotalk 02:05, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
FWIW, I would be more than open in modifying & clarifying the footnote—should it help us resolve this dispute.--Neve–selbert 02:34, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
@Neve-selbert:, Please see Wikipedia:Etiquette, which you seem completely lack in addressing other editors. Using the words ignorance and deviant is not constructive. Footnote states a false premise and is WP:OR as mentioned previously in discussion. Why is it that France is not placed as a subentry to Germany for 1942 list, .... Zero0000, I would like to point out that in Neve's latest suggestion (clarifying in footnote), in my interpretation, does not mean placing Palestine independently, and also keeps linking to PNA pages... Spirit Ethanol (talk) 06:08, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
I shall not be lectured on the false premise of breaching WP:EQ, least of all by you. Yes, you seemed to be ignorant on the ins and outs of the article layout and formatting; and yes, I had perceived your actions insofar as somewhat deviant, in a manner not totally unfamiliar with your behaviour involved alongside this dispute beforehand. So, why is France not placed as a "subentry" (sic) to Germany in 1942? Read the Vichy France article, it clearly states in the lead section that while the Vichy regime was the nominal government of France as a whole, Germany militarily occupied northern France—hence France retained its sovereignty under the sphere of Nazi influence. But, what does this issue have to do with the issue at hand? Beats me. Moving on, clarifying the footnotes seems to be the only agreeable and unanimous compromise we can come up with avoiding any serious or credible upset between any concerned editors and readers alike, e.g. per WP:CON. Again, you ignore the majority of the points I continually make, per WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, so I will try and refrain from going on about the same exact specifications of the issue-at-hand over and over. But to conclude, we must be clear that the Palestinian Authority is, in itself, both the central state and government of the proclaimed State of Palestine of 1988, since 1994. Since 2013, in both international and supranational forums, they have separately rebranded themselves as the State of Palestine or simply just Palestine—I am all for respecting and acknowledging this rebranding as such. The same just cannot be said with Israel, there is no "Israeli National Authority" and the branches between the Israeli president and prime minister are undoubtedly much further apart than those between their Palestinian counterparts. That being said, I continue to concur with Zoltan's attempts to mediate with this misunderstanding, and I encourage you to do the same also.--Neve–selbert 08:23, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Anybody alright with putting a footnote next to Palestine, describing its current status? GoodDay (talk) 14:41, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

There is in-fact already a footnote, although I am perfectly happy to elucidate the existing footnote for improved clarity, avoiding subsequent misapprehensions such as these in future.--Neve–selbert 19:15, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
I would suggest that we continue to list Palestine directly after Israel, not in bold, but simply to put the bullet point 'up' a level to the same as other states which claim sovereignty, to avoid it looking like a 'subentry', like a dependency. The footnote should then be edited to include, with references, a brief but accurate description of its sovereignty. We should then do this for all entries which claim sovereignty. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 20:42, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
As explained earlier, current footnote is WP:CIRCULAR and its presence violates WP:OR, a mandatory policy. I strongly doubt 'creative' layouts without 'meaning' description, such as one(s) currently used, are also WP:OR. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 20:50, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
Absolute nonsense. Keep the footnote as is for the moment, until we come up with an improved version via proper discussion.--Neve–selbert 22:17, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
@Super Nintendo Chalmers: The idea of moving Palestine up a bullet is a futile one, it goes against the alphabetical nature of the article. I will consider the option of adding references to the article-in-question carefully, although I believe that a better option would be to internally link to elucidating articles with substantive & substantial references instead. I think we should just stick to sorting out Palestine for now, as this is the main point of contention—we should avoid the risk of complicating this whole issue. So, after all, if the others ain't broke, don't "fix" them. SE has a problem with the Palestine entry, and this is the issue of which we should be wholly focusing our attention on resolving.--Neve–selbert 22:22, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
@Neve-selbert: But we come back to the point that I think it is broken - and you haven't convinced me that they're not (though I realize that I haven't convinced you that they are). If we don't 'upgrade' Palestine, Northern Cyprus and the rest, then the alternative could be to remove, or list separately, Guernsey, Curacao and the rest. At the moment, these groups of entries (Group 1: Alternative governments and unrecognized sovereign states; Group 2: sub-national unincorporated states) look too similar, and the article is at best unclear and at worse are potentially confusing or misleading as a result. The article would, in my view, be better if we changed the listing to differentiate more clearly between them. I also think that such changes really wouldn't change the article very much in the big picture.Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:16, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
But its not really about "upgrading" anything. You see, Palestine (or rather the PNA) was once originally considered as part of the 1948 State of Israel. One could note the following:
  1. Their secession began in 1988 with the proclamation of the State of Palestine.
  2. They were made governmentally effective in 1994 as the PNA per the Oslo Accords.
  3. They decided to rebrand the PNA as the State of Palestine or simply Palestine in 2013 in accordance with the UN.
The fourth step (either being fully independent of Israeli occupation or receiving greater international recognition than their neighbour) has not yet occured, hence that they have not yet completed geopolitically their full secession from Israel—in the same sense that Ireland has from the United Kingdom. This poignant fact similarly goes for Northern Cyprus, et al. From my point of view, listing them separately would do a great disservice to the article and I find it hard to bring myself to support such an option (e.g. when Crimea seceded from Ukraine in 2014, we did not include Crimea separately, but we included Crimea underneath Ukraine until they were absorbed by Russia). Moreover, Northern Cyprus was originally part of Cyprus and the Palestinian National Authority was originally part of Israel—but, as of 2016, they are both in a sort of stalemate as their process of independence has not yet been fully completed. There should not be anything too wrong with specifying the two groups, e.g. as there is really no credible alternative to this part of the status quo. Spirit Ethanol has a problem with the footnote at the moment. Perhaps we should be focusing our attention on changing that instead.--Neve–selbert 19:53, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
You're mistaken on your history. Palestine has never been considered part of Israel, especially not in 1948, when Israel was smaller than its widely recognised territories are now. Even after 1967, Israel has never formally annexed any of the captured Palestinian territory (East Jerusalem being a complicated edge case). CMD (talk) 21:39, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
Ah, my apologies. Although, what I had meant to convey was that the land controlled by the Palestinian Authority now, was controlled or occupied by the 1948 State of Israel back then. I understand that the case pertaining to Jerusalem is quite complicated, but it would be useful to note that many perceive both Israel and Palestine as sharing the same capital de jure, hence the confusion.--Neve–selbert 22:01, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
The land controlled by the Palestinian Authority and claimed by the recognised governments as future Palestinian land was not controlled by Israel until 1967. Between 1948 and 1967 it was controlled by Jordan and Egypt. CMD (talk) 23:32, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
Unfortunately, Neve-selvert, your words here show that your knowledge of the relevant history is extremely poor. Both of Chipmunkdavis' comments here are 100% correct, and I told you much the same earlier. These statements of yours are profoundly ahistorical: "the Palestinian National Authority was originally part of Israel", "Palestine (or rather the PNA) was once originally considered as part of the 1948 State of Israel", "the land controlled by the Palestinian Authority now, was controlled or occupied by the 1948 State of Israel back then". Nobody, including Israel, believes any of those. You also keep making statements about the 1988 declaration that are not in accordance with the facts. (Actually the UN makes no distinction between the state declared in 1988 and the non-member observer state admitted in 2012.) You contributed over 40% of this page on the basis of ignorance. Zerotalk 00:43, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
@Chipmunkdavis and Zero0000: Alright, I concede. Look, all I know of the Israel-Palestine conflict really is both what I read in the papers and on the Internet. I happen to adhere to the belief that Palestine is not fully sovereign partly due to the position of my government (UK) and my instinct. All I claim to be is an intermediate expert on the way the article-in-question is formatted, nothing more and nothing less. I am here to defend the layout of the article, and how this "substate" mythology is totally unfounded. I am not in any way an unswerving defender of the Zionist cause. Given my strenuous daily schedule, I duly acknowledge that I did indeed rush my arguments, and I should have bothered to back up my arguments with concrete fact. Yes, my knowledge of the subject is likely poor compared to yours. Although, having said that, I would not accept that I am mostly ignorant of the I-P issue; I happen to believe that although in theory Israel has nothing to do internally with the workings of the Palestinian Authority, the fact of the matter and on the ground shows that they very much do have a lot to do with them, hence the occupation, etc. Per WP:WEIGHT, Israel occupies more parts of Palestine than vice versa, so the Israel entry should be above the Palestine entry. Furthermore, perhaps the prime issue Spirit Ethanol (the creator of this Rfc) has with the article-in-question, is the footnote involved, claiming it breaches WP:CIRCULAR & WP:OR. This is fair enough. I think we should just do away with the footnote, it is likely to render superfluous to most readers (as  Palestine links to Palestinian National Authority, anyway, and they would be practically certain to find further information if they decide to click the article). This could be a compromise we could all agree on. I just cannot bring myself to accept a separate entry for Palestine, it seems too idealistic and does not accurately reflect the sovereignty of Palestine accurately enough. They have not yet completed their full route to absolute de facto independence, and they are de facto occupied by Israel. Of course, correct me if I have overlooked any certain details, although I remain reasonably certain that Palestine is not a sovereign state in its own geopolitical right, but rather an emerging one that is yet to fully contain its borders and diplomacy from the metaphorical vulture that is Israel.--Neve–selbert 06:23, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
<reduce indent> A good post in many ways. Afree that I think the page is better w/o footnote. I think we need to tease apart 'independence' and 'sovereignty', which are not synonymous. Palestine claims to be sovereign, and is recognized as such by more governments than not. I think it's reasonable to state that Palestine is sovereign, or at least has partially recognized sovereignty, but has rather limited if any independence. Convention on other Wikipedia pages is to draw a line between 'Partially unrecognized' states (Israel, China, Armenia etc) and 'Partially recognized' states (of which Kosovo and Palestine have significantly more recognition than others) and I'd be comfortable with seeing that continued here. What I think is at hand is how we differentiate and my position would be that the current system - of listing Palestine 'underneath' Israel isn't the best way. I've made a couple of suggestions as to the alternatives - either separate sections for 'partially recognized' states, or listing without being in bold text. We might think of others...
A couple of other minor points - it does not do to be too binaristic in our thinking about independence (Ukraine is under any reasonable definition 'independent' even though part of its claimed territory is governed by another country). I'm also not sure why the position of the UK government should be relevant in any way here, at least beyond that of any other national government; that would definitely be applying undue WP:WEIGHT --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:24, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
@Super Nintendo Chalmers: I understand your points. Although I must say, that the established convention on the article itself is that the only way Palestine can be displayed as completely separate from Israel is for the Palestinian Authority to pack up and move continent. For example, Gibraltar is displayed under the UK entry—as they are both part of the European continent—although Anguilla and Bermuda are not, as they are both part of North America. As they are outside Europe and are not integral parts of the United Kingdom (unlike Aruba with the Netherlands), they are completely listed as separate. The same cannot be said of Israel & Palestine, they are both geographically part of Asia. That would be the precedent. And I am not too keen on breaking it. On the Ukraine issue, I think that is slightly different. The Ukrainian capital (Kiev) is still intact as is still governed by the Ukrainian government. With Israel & Palestine, this turns into a dreadful can of worms due to the Jerusalem dispute. I mentioned the British government due to their permanent seat at the UN Security Council—although, having researched, they interestingly abstained on the Palestine vote in 2012 (unlike America).--Neve–selbert 20:02, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

Let's leave the footnote the way it was before this Rfc was opened. GoodDay (talk) 22:57, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

@GoodDay: That would be the way the footnote is now. Spirit Ethanol had attempted to remove the footnote twice—[3] & [4]—yesterday, though.--Neve–selbert 05:36, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
@GoodDay: Then again, perhaps we should just have no footnote. It seems to render as superfluous—as the entry already links to Palestinian National Authority anyway. However, perhaps the creator of the footnote (Bogdan Uleia) should defend his case beforehand, if he decides to.--Neve–selbert 06:23, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
Let's hear from Bogdan Uleia, indeed :) GoodDay (talk) 13:25, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
The Hague treaties are very clear about what an occupied territory is. And it's not an administrative subdivision of the occupying state. This is nonsense! Gerard von Hebel (talk) 17:25, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
@Hebel: Look, of course, that is nonsense. But, nobody is suggesting that the Palestinian National Authority is some sort of "administrative subdivision of Israel". If we were suggesting that, it would state thusly: (non-state administrative authority of Israel) and not (non-state administrative authority). This remains the prime confusion.--Neve–selbert 20:02, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
Neve, OK, but why is the entity, as the article stands now, depicted as a subdivision of Israel? Surely that's wrong even if it should not somehow be recognized as a separate state? Gerard von Hebel (talk) 20:25, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
Palestine has not yet completed its path of independence from Israel; the latter still occupies the former.--Neve–selbert 20:40, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
It doesn't have to achieve independence from Israel. It is not part of Israel and it never was part of Israel. How in heaven can you insist on your mistake even after it was pointed out to you repeatedly? Accept the historical facts and move on already.--TMCk (talk) 21:54, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
<reduce indent> I think, to be fair, that the intention is not to depict Palestine as a subdivision or part of Israel. I think that the effect is to do that, or at least to give the possible impression of that, but I don't think that's the intention of the current depiction. I've set out above possible solutions... Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 22:30, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
Another issue, of course, is that to describe Palestine as a 'Non-State Administrative Authority' has several problems. If it's truly 'non-state', one wonders why it should be listed here at all (answer: it is a state). If it is a state, then the description clearly needs changing. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 22:32, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
The Palestinian National Authority is a government. Both states and governments are permitted, hence the inclusion of the Syrian Interim Government, et al.--Neve–selbert 22:39, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
Whether Palestine is a full flung state or not, it shouldn't be depicted as a subset under Israel. That is wrong whatever way you look at it. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 00:18, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
This "Palestine is a subset under Israel" nonsense really needs to stop. A woeful and perpetual ignorance of how the article is formatted, really that is what the unsubstantiated claim is, nothing more and nothing less. So, for example: is Gibraltar a substate of the United Kingdom? Nope, but it is an Overseas Territory of the latter. Is Western Sahara (SADR) a substate of Morocco? Nope again, although the latter occupies the majority of territory claimed by the former. And, a similar sticky situations exists between Palestine & Israel. Look, please do not misread me. I am not attempting to deny the sovereignty of Palestine—although the fact of the matter is that the Palestinian National Authority (of 1994) is not 100% synonymous with the State of Palestine (of 1988). Correct me if I am wrong of course, although I am certain that the former controls and contains the claimed territory (i.e. the borders) more effectively than the latter does.--Neve–selbert 06:12, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
AFAIK: The Palestinian National Authority administers some parts of the territory claimed by the State of Palestine, a self-declared sovereign state recognized by ~130 nations. The PNA is itself split between Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and Fatah controlled areas of the West Bank, albeit with minimal cooperation between the two - they don't quite claim to be separate governments. Confusingly, the Fatah branch of this government has, since 2013, been calling itself the 'State of Palestine'.
Re: your other points - we all know the intention is not to list Palestine and a substate of Israel, but the effect of the format is to create this impression. Indeed, mixing these two examples is, for me, indicative of the issue here. There is too much of a difference between SADR and Gibraltar for them to be displayed in the same way on a page like this. The distinction between an Overseas Territory and a Sovereign State w/o Recognition is significant, and I think it's highly misleading for this list to only distinguish between these via footnotes or descriptions in parentheses. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:27, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

The V Word

Without wanting to determine the terms, I wonder if there's any interest in moving towards a vote? I realise that we don't need to have one and that there are issues with votes, but it may be useful to consolidate? We could, roughly, offer three options: status quo; change display of Palestine; change display of Palestine AND other non-fully recognised sovereign states. Obviously, if anyone wants to suggest different options then all is good. We could after this then discuss the terms of any changes. I have little experience of RfCs so am happy to delay on this idea if it's not appropriate while the RfC is running. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 22:38, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

There should also be an option of solely removing the footnote. Then again, a vote will be redundant and misleading anyway (as most editors adhere to the erroneous belief that Palestine is somehow displayed as a "substate" of Israel). You are aware that local consensus was ignored by Spirit Ethanol prior to the opening of the above Rfc, aren't you? Besides, the Rfc ends in 11 days, so we should just wait until then. Perhaps another Rfc will have to be opened—who knows?--Neve–selbert 22:43, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
OK, as I say, I'm unfamiliar with the process - but yes, waiting 11 days does not seem much. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:14, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Footnote or no footnote?

Spirit Ethanol, the instigator of this dispute, has a problem with the footnote (see above) involved with the article-in-question. He claims that it does not sufficiently adhere both to WP:CIRCULAR and WP:OR. His assertions are duly noted. Henceforth, I have a new proposition, and perhaps a route to a possible compromise. We can either do away with the footnote completely or rectify, elucidate, etc. a new footnote replacing the old one that has been called into question. I, for one, would prefer the former option—a footnote is likely to render as superfluous and unnecessary as the link to Palestine above ( Palestine) already directs to Palestinian National Authority anyway, making any such footnote redundant, in my opinion.--Neve–selbert 06:23, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Sufficient arguments have been given so far for linking to State of Palestine rather than Palestinian National Authority (PNA), with no consensus whatsoever on linking to PNA. In case you plan on insisting on linking to PNA, best to create a new section, third opinion request, or an Rfc to avoid a future edit dispute. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 09:36, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
I agree. This question is based on the premise that the link Palestinian National Authority|Palestine makes sense in an article called 'List of state leaders in 2016', but it does not make sense. The link State of Palestine|Palestine makes sense. I think it is probably accurate to say that the chance of reaching a consensus based on a Palestinian National Authority|Palestine link is nil. This renders discussion based on the premise of this question redundant. If there is to be a footnote, it should be a footnote about the state. Sean.hoyland - talk 11:10, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
@Sean.hoyland: Ah, so this compromise will render redundant then? Oh, bother. Why whitewash the Palestinian National Authority? Has it been dissolved? No. Is it still relevant? Yes, it is. Why would we suddenly decide to act as if it doesn't even exist? Are you honestly trying to tell me that the State of Palestine (of 1988) is synonymous with the National Authority (of 1994)? Well, AFAIK it is not. The State of Palestine contains the whole of the West Bank (Zone A) and Gaza (Zone B) as claimed by the PNA, whereas the PNA contains parts and not all of the West Bank (A). So, which between the two controls and contains the claimed territory (i.e. the borders) more effectively: the latter or the former? This is patently absurd. Governments and states are allowed on the article-in-question—so your point about the link Palestinian National Authority|Palestine making no sense "in an article called 'List of state leaders in 2016'", is a preposterous one. If we were following this rule, then we would exclude heads of government in favour of solely heads of state, instead. Look, the fact of the matter is: the State of Palestine is occupied and not entirely effective de facto as a sovereign state in its own right.--Neve–selbert 19:13, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
The State of Palestine is recognised as a sovereign state by 130ish nations. The PNA is recognized as its government. In practice, the PNA governs a portion of the State of Palestine. Palestine is not independent, but it is partially recognized as sovereign. We do need to be precise in our use of sovereign and independent here - they mean different things.
Equally, I think that the discussion of Palestine's independence/sovereignty is a bit of a red herring. No one's claiming that Palestine is fully independent; no-one's claiming that Palestine has no claim to sovereignty. We need to use precise terminology - which is one of the issues of this page (it has no clear definition of 'state'!!!). Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 20:39, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
This is dispute remains still a dreadful can of worms. We all need to give and take on this. We should just get rid of the footnote and move on to more important things. FWIW, Palestinian government and Palestinian National Authority are both separate articles in their own right. Dismissing the PNA as "just the government of Palestine" is inaccurate and an oversimplification of the issue-at-hand. The State of Palestine proclaimed in 1988 cannot be considered a sovereign state in its own right on par with Egypt or Jordan, etc. Again, remove the footnote and any other suggestions for further change can be considered with or without yet another Rfc in due time. There is no deadline.--Neve–selbert 21:20, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
Although I have reverted it as I don't think that it's appropriate to do during the RfC, a variation of this edit would quite simply and efficiently clear things up. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 10:12, 3 March 2016 (UTC)
@Super Nintendo Chalmers: I would have to disagree with you there. As much as I appreciate attempts for compromise, I am very much content with limited and partially recognised states being included under each continent of which they are part; the flawed mentality that because Palestine is directly implemented underneath Israel is due to it being some sort of sub-state of it remains preposterous, it makes absolute sense. The latter is under the occupation of the former. Why and how on earth this is controversial is beyond me. I understand some of the offence taken with the footnote, and I would be willing to do away with it. Although, apart from that, I honestly see no clear rationale for tinkering around with the layout and formatting of not only the article-in-question, but perhaps a thousand in addition.--Neve–selbert 19:47, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Comment Note that List_of_current_state_leaders_by_date_of_assumption_of_office don't list any dependencies, only sovereign states and limited recognized states (all handled separately). If we think Palestine don't have control over its territory and therefore non-sovereign-capable, we should simply delete it. This is not about dependency leaders and even if this is, Palestine is not a dependency/sub-state of Israel. ibicdlcod (talk) 03:52, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

@Ibicdlcod: FWIW, the Palestinian leaders (Abbas & Hamdallah) are actually included in the list that you mention. I find it peculiar indeed that only sovereign leaders are included over at that list; the article-in-question is named List of state leaders in 2016 and not List of sovereign state leaders in 2016. Furthermore, I must add that simply deleting Palestine from the list would likely render as counterproductive and would produce major uproar, the last thing we need. I honestly believe that the best thing we need is to clearly mark down the inclusion criteria per WP:NPOV—that is: states that are occupied by another state, are implemented underneath the occupying state, per the science of deduction that the occupied state is under occupation within the given year (2016, etc.). If people can understand that logic, and not the nonsensical "substate" fantasy perception, then perhaps this dispute-of-sorts will be over in no time. Just to give a bit of backstory, the user who started this whole hullabaloo in the first place was Spirit Ethanol, whom had reverted my reverting edit by another user (AusLondonder) a few hours prior. He then proceed to revert me repeatedly (on the false premise that I was "making changes" without consensus, when the opposite had been the case) until I reported him for breaching WP:3RR. Cutting a long story short, he then proceeded to open this Rfc with total disregard for seeking local consensus per WP:RFC. To make matters worse also, he then made his way to title the above Rfc misleadingly, inventing the fallacy that Palestine is somehow displayed as a "substate to Israel". And then, a whole truckload of editors landed to voice their dismay at a presumed injustice. His conduct has been at best unorganised and at worst reckless, and I have struggled to keep up from time to time. Primariliy, he has voiced a problem with the footnote involved (as per WP:CIRCULAR and WP:OR), so I decided (after having thought about it for some time) to give way to him and do away with it. I gave and he has taken. Yet, he is still dissatisfied. Lastly, the Rfc concludes in around a dozen days, so things should clear up better by then.--Neve–selbert 07:03, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

Palestinian National Authority vs. State of Palestine

Just got reverted here, an edit that links Palestine to State of Palestine rather than PNA. No consensus at all so far to linking to PNA. I would like to request a third opinion to assess consensus on linking to PNA, and reinstate edit otherwise. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 20:53, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

The PNA controls the territories claimed by the State of Palestine. You would do well to read Zoltan Bukovszky's cases-in-point above. Per WP:STATUSQUO, the revert should be retained.--Neve–selbert 20:57, 4 March 2016 (UTC)
Moreover, I find it rather amusing that SE has remarked that there is "no consensus at all so far to linking to PNA", since that has been the status quo since 2005!--Neve–selbert 22:56, 4 March 2016 (UTC)
The "so far" in the statement "no consensus at all so far to linking to PNA" indicates that the scope of that statement is this RfC discussion. The reason a person might say that there is no consensus so far for linking to the PNA as opposed to the State of Palestine is that no RS/policy based arguments have been provided to support linking to the PNA whereas RS/policy based arguments have been provided to support linking to the State of Palestine. The only arguments that have been provided for the current link to the PNA have been based on personal, often misinformed views about the real world, but these are not relevant to content decisions or consensus. For example, the statement "The PNA controls the territories claimed by the State of Palestine", apart from being wrong or perhaps an example of poor phrasing, is neither an argument for or against linking to the PNA or the State of Palestine. It's merely an editor's personal view of the real world, which on a Wikipedia talk page is noise rather than signal. This RfC has been open for several weeks and you have not cited a single reliable source to support any of the very many statements you have made or even acknowledged the existence and content of any of the reliable sources that have been cited here. This is extraordinary. Sean.hoyland - talk 20:43, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
@Sean.hoyland: This is getting ridiculous. I wrote the statement you called into question quickly, and it should have read: The PNA controls most of the territories claimed by the State of Palestine. Moreover, Palestine is not a state yet—surely this is common sense? This source is quite apt for judgment. Furthermore, the consensus has been for over a decade to include the PNA and not the proclaimed "State of Palestine". I would also refer you this apt discussion at the Reference desk.--Neve–selbert 22:43, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
If you watch video in source you provided, "State of Palestine" is used to refer UN envoy and not "Palestinian National Authority", and envoy is not seated behind Israel. Is this your source for using PNA instead of State of Palestine and using subentries? Proposed resolution mentioned in source is about full membership, Palestine already a UN observer state (source: UN) Spirit Ethanol (talk) 07:59, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
Well, the PNA doesn't "control most of the territories claimed by the State of Palestine" either and that is still just a random personal view. But let's move past that and you can go and find out about what the PNA controls in your own time. For the sake of efficiency, you ought to stop writing what you think you know on this talk page as it just doesn't matter. Stick to sources and certainly not Wikipedia reference desks. While it's good to see a source cited, the CNN source is not exactly an example of great source given that the statement "Palestine currently is not recognized as a state" is inconsistent with Palestine being recognised as a state by 2/3 of UN members, among other things. Perhaps they meant something a bit more nuanced given that the article was about this draft resolution that would have meant Palestine becoming a full UN member state if it had passed. Either way, this is one of hundreds of sources saying all sorts of things about the State of Palestine, inconsistency between sources is the norm and Wikipedia has to deal with it. If your position is that Palestine is not a state and that is why the link should be to the PNA, then that is an untenable position given all of the sources that say that it is a state recognized by 2/3 of UN members, a state with President and a Prime Minister, a state with non-member observer state status at the UN, a state that has acceded to the Rome Statute[5][6] among other things. If you mean that the link should be to the PNA because the state is not fully independent, then say that, be precise, and try to make RS/policy based arguments to explain why Wikipedia would send readers to the PNA article via a Palestine link when the PNA is a product of the Oslo Accords and has no authority over most of the State of Palestine (e.g. Area C) when a far simpler straightforward approach is to just do what sources like the UN, ISO, the ICC do, and present information about the state. Area C isn't even covered by this list right now with a link to the PNA because it is not part of Israel and it is not governed by the PNA. Sean.hoyland - talk 17:02, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
Ah, red herring. I have already stated beforehand the indisputable fact that the PNA rebranded itself as State of Palestine back in January 2013 at international forums, etc. Furthermore, the Palestine membership at the UN is merely observer status (unlike Israel, which has member status). Of course, one can pretend to be deliberately devoid of the facts, and spin.--Neve–selbert 09:02, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
You still haven't provided a source that justifies use of PNA or a that State of Palestine is not a state, Spirit Ethanol (talk) 15:40, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
Regarding your 'red herring' argument about rebranding, there is more to it than that. Bear in mind that Palestine was submitting state related things to the UN as the State of Palestine with documents signed by the President of the State of Palestine long before that rebranding took place e.g. [7] Regarding "the Palestine membership at the UN is merely observer status", yes, Palestine membership at the UN is as a non-member observer state and the word "state" is a clue. So next time you have an urge to tell people your personal views on this, don't bother. Sean.hoyland - talk 17:02, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Closing

Well, we're in the final week of this Rfc. It feels like a long road, but hopefully, an administrator will soon make his/her judgement & then close. GoodDay (talk) 13:07, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

I would hope the administrator realises the lack of consensus for changing the status quo since 2005 and 2009 respectively. This has been the established consensus for some time now. I also would wish both Bogdan Uleia and Zoltan Bukovszky (almost WikiGnomes in this sort of area) would make their views clearer on this—both expressing opposition to such changes.--Neve–selbert 22:17, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
Well, I would say that whatever comes out of this, the present state of the article can't really be upheld under any interpretation or argument. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 22:54, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
@Hebel: We certainly can get complete rid of the footnote (as per WP:OR & WP:CIRCULAR), although apart from that, I see no problem with the status quo.--Neve–selbert 23:03, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
The footnote is not the thing that principally bothers me (although some remarks could be made). Differences of opinion about the status of Palestinian statehood is also not the point. What bothers me is that the present state of the article suggests that, whatever the State of Palestine's status under International law may be, it is connected to the sovereignty of the State of Israel. That is just plain wrong! Gerard von Hebel (talk) 23:20, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

@Hebel: It is hard not to be ambivalent to your concerns, and I do not dismiss them in any way whatsoever. I think we are misunderstanding a key case-in-point here, which is the pinnacle of the relationship between Palestine/PNA and Israel. The principle of this part of the article is mainly to express the lack of complete sovereignty Palestine/PNA has from Israel. Unlike the Taiwan/China scenario, Israel remains very much involved with the Palestinians on a day-to-day basis and, unlike Taiwan, the Palestinians openly struggle to practice their sovereignty freely and widely without major disruption. It persists in being that the shadow Israel casts over Palestine (as of 2016) is undeniable. The former occupies the latter and, until Palestine is free (similar somewhat to the Irish Free State from the UK), I believe the status quo should be temporarily retained (albeit with tweaks here and there). Moreover, I will also note that the patent fact that Palestine is not literally displayed as "of Israel)"—unlike Gibraltar which is literally displayed as "of the United Kingdom)"—further goes to prove against the notion that Palestine is somehow purposely arranged as under the sovereignty of Israel. The fact of the matter remains that Palestine is unequivocally not "of Israel)", and the article just goes to show. I fully understand why it would be an outrage if we were to literally suggest that. We won't and will never do. The status at current is that of Palestine/PNA being currently a "non-state administrative authority". This could indeed be tweaked for a more accurate description, in due course. Although, my position still remains that the layout really just should be retained for now, as the suggestion that Palestine/PNA is displayed as a "substate/subnation of Israel" is really just someone's inaccurate and misled POV—something that has already been debunked. Furthermore, it would even be inaccurate to regard Gibraltar as a substate of the UK, let alone Palestine with Israel. In my opinion, Spirit Ethanol—basically the perp in all this—is recklessly exploiting this issue in a Machiavellian way, and his reasoning for such behaviour remains bizarre. If he really cared deeply about this issue, he would have looked for local consensus on the talk page before choosing to cause a huge commotion with a premature RFC. It is his harum-scarum that has caused the blatant lack of discussion organisation. Whatever the result of this RFC, he should not get away with his bull-in-a-china-shop approach with this very sensitive issue of which I realise has caused great upset and distress to a number of people. I am not intransigent as others may have suggested and I am open to compromise, although I believe the least change to the status quo remains the safest and least WP:FRINGE bet for an option.--Neve–selbert 07:28, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
Hello Neve, I appreciate your comment and I will come back to what you have said. For the time being (I will have more time later and will take some time to reflect on this) there is just one comment I would like to make at present. You speak of "the lack of complete sovereignty Palestine/PNA has from Israel".... The thing is that, as an occupying power, it's not for Israel to grant or withhold sovereignty as understood in International law, i.o.w. state recognition. I'm not in favour of the present graphic display and the places where things are in the article. But I do acknowledge that a balanced solution is possible and I perceive you're willing to consider suggestions. I'll make a suggestion soon, after some thought about this. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 00:15, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

I propose the changes shown below to address the many concerns that have been raised about the way the Palestine entry is presented to readers in this and related articles. Related articles like List of current heads of state and government and List of sovereign states do not use this kind of parent-child hierarchy for Israel and Palestine and already display the 2 states as separate entries. So the proposal is nothing new, it is standard practice in RS and Wikipedia (with these List of state leaders in <year> articles apparently being outliers).

The Israel entry would change from this...

...to separate entries for Israel and Palestine (including brief footnote) something like this.

Sean.hoyland - talk 09:39, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Footnotes

  1. ^ The Palestinian Authority renamed itself as State of Palestine in 2013—a move unrecognised by Israel. It is not to be confused with the proclaimed State of Palestine in 1988—by the Palestinian National Council (PNC) in Algeria—which remains a putative state, in-fact ineffective, despite partial international recognition.
  2. ^ The State of Palestine is a partially recognized state under Israeli occupation. In 2012, the United Nations General Assembly accorded non-Member Observer State status to Palestine.
It is fine, though why "non-Member" rather than "Non-member"? Zerotalk 09:55, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Lazy copy/paste/direct quote from the UN site here. Also, after all the discussion I should add that in fact I'm opposed to the existence of this page because it does not automatically inherit its content from List of current heads of state and government and is instead maintained by people. It might be better to redirect to List of current heads of state and government and at the end of each year capture the List of current heads of state and government information as a List of state leaders in <year> article. Sean.hoyland - talk 10:00, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Bogdan Uleia, who may have written the original footnote here, an editorializing WP:OR policy violation that has been copied to several articles, has employed a 1RR violation here to express their personal view via Wikipedia that the State of Palestine does not have a Prime Minister. Since that kind of behavior is relevant to the proposal above, I should clarify that Rami Hamdallah is as a matter of fact described by official sites as Prime Minister of the State of Palestine e.g. this and this. Since the government of Palestine has renamed the Palestinian National Authority to the "State of Palestine" this is hardly surprising. Also, see the UN report "Status of Palestine in the United Nations - Report of the Secretary-General A/67/738 8 March 2013" and the reference to the previous Prime Minister Salam Fayyad a few months before Rami Hamdallah became the Prime Minister of the State of Palestine.
  • "3. On 12 December 2012, Palestine informed the Secretary-General that the designation “State of Palestine” should be used in all documents and for its nameplate in all United Nations meetings. It further informed the Secretary-General that the Head of State was Mahmoud Abbas, President of the State of Palestine. On 8 January 2013, Palestine informed the Secretary-General that the Head of Government was Salam Fayyad, Prime Minister of the State of Palestine, and that the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the State of Palestine was Riad Malki. In accordance with its request, the designation “State of Palestine” is now used in all documents of the United Nations and on nameplates to be used in United Nations meetings. Mr. Abbas is now addressed as the President of the State of Palestine, Mr. Fayyad as the Prime Minister of the State of Palestine and Mr. Malki as the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the State of Palestine." (my bolding)
This is just one of many UN documents that refer to the Prime Minister of the State of Palestine. Sean.hoyland - talk 16:17, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Excuse me to intervene somewhat off-topic but I want to clarify once and for all the problem of the entities called “Palestine” They are two different entities -the first ‘State of Palestine” proclaimed on 15 November 1988 by the Palestinian National Council (PNC) in Algiers, in fact a government in exile which do not control the territory rededicated. The state of Palestine has a president but instead of government has the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization lead by a chairman, in present the same person as the president and a Parliament called Palestinian National Council. -the second is in fact Palestinian National Authority which renamed itself the State of Palestine on 6 January 2013. The PNA has a president, a government led by a prime minister and a Parliament named Palestinian Legislative Council. So constitutionally speaking, the only link between these two entities is the name and the person of the president. Bogdan Uleia (talk)

You are entirely wrong about this. There is only one "State of Palestine". In 2013 the PNA announced that it should henceforth be known by the name of the state declared in 1988. Otherwise there would have been a new declaration of independence, but instead the SoS adopted the 1988 declaration, see here. You can also check that the UNGA resolution admitting the SoP to non-member state status refers explicitly to former resolutions regarding the 1988 declaration. Zerotalk 23:22, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

@Sean.hoyland: Your above proposal(s) is/are futile and incredulous. Firstly, it goes against the alphabetical nature of the list. Secondly, this "parent-child hierarchy" nonsense is simply a WP:NPOV conspiracy that you yourself have made up (and just goes to underline your absolute ignorance of the layout and formatting of the article-in-question—read my statement above). FWIW, this is a big decision in regards to Palestine, and we should broaden a discussion to include all editors regularly involved with the article-in-question. Compromise is possible, it just might take a bit longer than the next four days. Besides, I am totally fine with getting rid of the footnote, so long as we maintain the layout and formatting of the status quo. Anything otherwise just borders disruption with established precedent and will render unacceptable. Palestine is not yet 100% independent of Israel, and the article should not and will not whitewash this patent fact. An interesting sidenote: if Israel happened to occupy Palestine further west in Africa, we probably wouldn't even have this problem, as they both would be separated through different continents and hence different sections.--Neve–selbert 18:34, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Proposal is a great starting point post conclusion of RfC, given states placed in alphabetical order. Addresses concerns raised in this discussion and in line with general discussion consensus. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 18:51, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Oh well, you would think that wouldn't you? Never mind ignoring local consensus or misleading a premature Rfc, and all that nothingness. Your conduct has been disgraceful.--Neve–selbert 18:53, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
It's nice that you thought I was suggesting putting Israel and Palestine next to each other like lovers, but of course I wasn't. That would be silly. I'm familiar with some alphabets and the notion of sorting, as is everyone else here I'm guessing, so I apologize if it was unclear. Regarding "and just goes to underline your absolute ignorance of the layout and formatting of the article-in-question", two things, firstly, it's not a good idea to be rude to me, and secondly, I understand the intent of the layout and formatting of the article perfectly well, but I also understand it's effect on people evident from their comments. Try this. Does this look like something? Would someone telling you over and over again that it doesn't look like that make you stop seeing it that way? Certainly not. You can tell people that thing that looks like a parent-child hierarchical structure actually represents occupation or some other hidden attribute (that for mysterious reasons isn't simply described using language) but they will not buy it because they recognize that it is not a good idea. There is no point complaining about how people see things and interpret structures and you cannot "debunk" it. [[User:Sean.hoyland]] - talk 19:27, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Just think: had Spirit Ethanol reworded and refrained from bias in his launch of Rfc, people would have had a different idea. Had he sought local consensus? God knows. Look, Palestine is not fully de facto separate from Israel and the article just goes to show that, bluntly if you will. Unlike the Irish Free State of 1922, Palestine has not yet completed its path to independence from Israel, and is hence underneath the Israel entry. If Palestine were in Africa and Israel still happened to occupy it, it would be listed separately. It is just the layout of the article that prevents this from happening. Not WP:OR in any way, shape, or form.--Neve–selbert 19:43, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Actually Sean's proposal meets all reasonable objections. The names will be placed in the correct alphabetical order (of course). The footnote explains everything that is different about this state compared to others. Now you contributed about 50% of this whole page, mostly by repeating yourself over and over and over. Consensus is not determined by who wrote the most. It's time to stop. Zerotalk 22:19, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Well. Only in your opinion, of course. Look, there is no consensus. Heck, there wasn't even a local consensus. His proposal is without credibility and blatantly borders WP:FRINGE, and I plan to appeal any decision—God forbid—in favour of it all the way. Once everything goes the way it should, then I shall stop. That being said, I must note that I do not take travesties of justice lightly. I have explained my reasons as to exactly why within my statement above.--Neve–selbert 23:04, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
Basically this page consists of you arguing against almost everyone else. As well as that, your repeated declaration that you will not accept a decision that you don't like is appalling. If I wasn't an "involved" administrator I would have banned you from this page by now. Zerotalk 23:25, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
"Almost everyone else"? What nonsense. Users Bogdan Uleia, Zoltan Bukovszky, and even GoodDay, have all expressed a preference for the status quo. So that kind of spin is redundant on your part. On the outcome? I certainly will appeal any decision taken in favour of the perp who started this gun-jumping Rfc, as I (as a party) have every right to do so. "Banning" me from this page is practically just another way almost of saying "just ignore him, he's a lunatic". Of course, you mention the alleged 50% of contributions that I have made on this page. I would place a bet that you have only read—not scan-read—less than a quarter of that. Look, if you would prefer me to stop contributing to the discussion, then perhaps read and stop side-lining my concerns over Sean.hoyland's proposal. I would perhaps know this for sure if you could possibly respond to my scepticism individually one-by-one. Indeed, repeating myself over and over is frustrating and I would rather not do it. On a separate note, going by your arguments, why isn't Palestinian National Authority redirected to State of Palestine? Hebel stated that the PNA does not exist anymore. The article states otherwise, hence the present tense. All in all, confusion & misunderstanding is rampant in this discussion.--Neve–selbert 01:44, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
Let's relax & wait for the Rfc to be closed :) GoodDay (talk) 01:46, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
Sean Hoyland's suggestion above is very close to what I posed several weeks ago and is something I'd support. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 07:56, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

Summary as of March 9. This was hard to compile and I could make mistakes. People who think they are in the wrong list, please ask to be moved.

  • Want Palestine gone altogether—2 : Benjil, ibicdlcod
  • Support listing Palestine under Israel—3/4 : GoodDay, Neve-selbert, Sir Joseph(?), ZBukov
  • Support listing Palestine separately from Israel—19/21 : AusLondonder, Bolter21(?), CMD, Cliftonian, Debresser, Gerard von Hebel, Golbez, GreyShark, Legacypac, Makeandtoss, Marcocapelle(?), NMMNG, NaBUru38, Ninney, Sean.Hoyland, Sepsis II, Spirit Ethanol, Super Nintendo Chalmers, TMCk, Wykx, Zero

The consensus is obvious and overwhelming. Zerotalk 07:37, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

"The consensus is obvious and overwhelming." You can either laugh or cry at that one.
19 contributors in favour of the changes? I would strongly recommened that the closing admins cuts that short to just 7. Reasons being:
  • The other 12 simply stated their reasonable and totally justifiable judgment at a blatantly misleading and fraudulent Rfc.
    • Now, if I happened to be a wandering, blissfully ignorant (on the article layout) editor like them I would certainly have come up with a similar judgment.
      • It would (at first glance) appear to be the morally right and logical thing to do.
    • I am not of course and—considering my seven-month experience with the article-at-hand—my conclusion was that there was no such issue and the premise of the question was fundamentally wrong.
Three following points I would also like to make:
  1. Your above assessment is clever spin alongside minimal substance, and a very dismissive and narrow-minded one at that.
  2. I strongly believe that the result of this discussion should have the option of being no consensus hence moratorium (as Palestine gains more and more international recognition—i.e. surpassing Israel—then this "problem" should be looked at again without doubt).
  3. Here is the perhaps now-infamous edit of 23 February 2009, which caused all this apparent disruption and chaos over 7 years ago. ZBukov happened to be the one who started all this back then. If anything, he should make a closing statement as to why or why he does not regret his 2009 edit. FWIW, I have had a troubled history with this editor, although on this issue alone I support the retention of his layout realignment of 2009.
Also, I would like you to note the following: despite the State of Palestine being proclaimed in 1988, only the 1994 formation of the National Authority earned its placement over here unlike over here.
  • So conclusively, there is no consensus. None whatsoever—alternatives to the status quo have been successfully and credibly proven unworkable and against the established precedent that the List of state leaders in XXXX articles have adhered to for years on end. Make the changes, and wreck hundreds of article for the sake of a flawed and misled consistency. I absolutely hope that the closing admin will take the poor discussion structure as a rationale for a moratorium at least into account (as local consensus was ignored and per WP:RFC this is not procedure). The concerns that Spirit Ethanol had should indeed have been made initially without an Rfc. It would be the least damaging and irregular outcome to soon consider, for now at least.--Neve–selbert 09:19, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
I see, you don't like people voting differently from you so they should be ignored. Got it. By the way, your repeated pinging of Bogdan, now seven times, is in blatant violation of WP:CANVASS. Your idea that the international standing of Palestine today is comparable to 7 years ago is simply mind-boggling. In 2009 I would have omitted Palestine from the list altogether. Times change, articles change, c'est la vie. Zerotalk 09:42, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
I duly apologise for the apparent excess of pinging, and I will use {{No ping}} from now on. Moving on, my concerns are straightforward. Among several other perturbing concerns, people are voting without knowing the full facts and details of the layout of the article-in-question. The fact that you are unaware as to why Palestine was included back in 2009 is the real mind-boggling surprise that I had not expected. I fully support Palestine's inclusion from 1993 onwards. Furthermore, this article does not merit individual states through recognition. Palestine has not surpassed the recognition of Israel and, since the latter occupies the dependent former, it makes complete sense to have the Palestine entry under the Israel one. Remember, had Israel decided to occupy a state in a different continent (as with America vis-a-vis Iraq), this problem would have never even occurred (as they would be listed in separate sections per consistent organisation). So, if Palestine is not bolded, it means quite simply that is not fully independent (e.g. per Ireland vis-a-vis the UK). The fact remains, whether you like it or not: Palestine is not fully independent of Israel. Only the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip could have possibly been considered absolutely independent—although the recognition for them has been nil. As Palestine remains geographically in Asia and not fully sovereign, it must under all circumstances be contained under a particular sovereign entity—i.e. the one that it had originally seceded or set apart from—to qualify for inclusion. There is no witch hunt against Palestine/PNA. This is just the way it has happened to be for almost 3/4 of a decade. I am free to enlighten any other sceptism, although I must note that I have explained the bulk of it in one of my previous statements. Lastly, I am not ignoring anyone. Those that went the extra mile beyond the survey should be differentiated from those that simply glanced over a deceiving Rfc, this is common sense.--Neve–selbert 10:12, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
I concur that the RfC question was positively misleading, which must have influenced the results. It would be inconsistent with the rest of the article (and misleading to the reader) if a country with incomplete sovereignty was shown the same way as independent states are. By incomplete sovereignty I mean that either the full control over territory and populace, or its international recognition is missing. All other such states (e.g. Western Sahara, Kosovo, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Nagorno Karabakh, Transnistria, Somaliland, Northern Cyprus) are listed under the state that occupies them or from which they seceded (without implying that they are regarded as a sub-national unit of that country). The situation of Palestine is clearly distinct from cases where two rival governments claim to represent the same entire country (e.g. the rebels and the recognized government in Syria and Yemen, Spain and Greece during their respective civil wars, or even China and Taiwan today) or when a pre-existing independent country is temporarily occupied, like Iraq was in 2003 (since Palestine has not existed as recognized, independent state in modern times). However if the majority of editors votes to incorporate this inconsistency into the article, then we should at least put an explanatory note behind the country's name (not just a footnote) that would clearly distinguish it from fully independent countries and would concisely sum up Palestine's status. ZBukov (talk) 14:09, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
What applies to Palestine should also apply to other states. It should not be left to the reader to interpret what the "parent-child" format means, which in my opinion is original research, unseen anywhere else on wikipedia or reliable sources, only unique to this page series. What can be expressed via visual layout can be expressed via text, and referenced if necessary. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 15:18, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
I strongly agree that the changes to Palestine ought to apply to other states with limited recognition of sovereignty. I would be against changing Palestine only - as Zoltan Bukovsky points out, this would insert a pointless inconsistency into the article. I take it that @Sean.hoyland: above deliberately did not use bold text for Palestine in his suggested edit, and I'd also support continuing to do this to reflect its different status. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 15:41, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
To clarify, I didn't deliberately use normal text rather than bold text to convey a hidden/unexpressed attribute of a state. I wouldn't do that. It was accidental. Bolding should follow the MOS. My view is that anything that is based on Wikipedia editors attempting to model the real world based on home-grown decision procedures and what they think they know, expressed using potentially ambiguous structural and visual devices is very likely to be a bad idea. This article is a good example of what can go wrong. Keep it simple (like ISO an international standard), consistent with RS, the MOS and all relevant policies and guidelines. The purpose of this RfC is to address the Israel-Palestine entries. If fixing that results in a local inconsistency (within a local wiki-reality) it is still one less thing to fix. Sean.hoyland - talk 16:18, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
WP:MOSTEXT doesn't say anything against using bold text for emphasis in lists, unless I've misread it. Any differences can be fully explained with a key. Fixing one entry and not others does not simplify; it complicates. Reliable sources frequently differentiate between the status of fully recognized sovereign states and those with limited recognition. Removing one problem - an unclear listing of limited sovereignty states - and replacing it with another - listing these entities in different ways - is worse than doing nothing; if the option is to change Palestine only, then I'd stand with Neve-Selbert and do nothing --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 17:00, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
@Super Nintendo Chalmers: Subject of this RfC is Palestine entry in specific. That the visual layout is flawed, unsourced, and ambiguous is a concern raised in this discussion with general consensus on addressing. Other entries can be updated upon conclusion of this discussion or in parallel (create a new section for all partially recognized states). Spirit Ethanol (talk) 18:09, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
Re: MOS:BOLD, I assume the names are bold because they are 'Article title terms' but who knows. Keys can be helpful as long as they aren't based on original research e.g. Wikipedia editors using in-house measurement systems for classification. Fixing one entry fixes one entry. It's an incremental improvement which is exactly how Wikipedia works. Fixing more than one entry is obviously better than fixing one entry but I have no reason to believe that a suitable solution will be found, nor do I have any reason to care about that because it is outside of the scope of this RfC. That is a something for another RfC to deal with, an RfC that explicitly states the problem that needs to be discussed and resolved. Sean.hoyland - talk 18:23, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
I must say that I mostly agree with the proposal made by User:Sean.hoyland. The reasoning behind that is as following: Even if we, for the sake of argument, say that Palestine is not yet a completely independent state, the problem is not that it is dependent on (or a dependency of) Israel, where International law is concerned, but that it's territory is partially occupied by Israel. Which are two very different matters. The examples given above (Irish Freestate) are therefore of an entirely different nature altogether. Clarification of the situation should be in text (footnote). The relation that Palestine or any entity existing on the territory thereof has with Israel is not one of dependency under International Law. The practical dependence of Israel that does exist is of another nature. It has nothing to do with a relation of sovereignty, but of occupation. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 17:18, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
Making a distinction between independence and sovereignty can be of great theoretical value (as it was regarding Iraq's 2003 occupation), but the practical question about countries is if they are independent. And while Palestine's sovereignty is recognized by a large number of states (which is only the external aspect of sovereignty), she is clearly not independent (there are foreign troops on her territory against her will, deeply involved in the running of the state, and it has never been otherwise since she declared her independence). So to my mind the proper description of the relationship between Israel and Palestine under international law is secondary in importance to the question of whether Palestine is independent or not. ZBukov (talk) 18:00, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
That could be handled by following ISO and using a Boolean attribute to indicate whether a state is independent. Sean.hoyland - talk 18:23, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
The purpose of this article is to depict who state leaders are (or have been) during the running year. We should keep in mind that this is the prime subject of the article. In the process we may have problems describing what Palestine, or Kosovo, or Taiwan actually and precisely are. But I think that can be described in brief footnotes. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 19:41, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
I agree wholeheartedly with Zoltan Bukovszky. Palestine is not yet fully independent de facto and—despite the international recognition—the situation on the ground has not overwhelmingly changed (as the PNA does still exist as a tier above a usual sovereign government as the prime representative of the Palestinian government and people). Hebel was incorrect in his insinuation that PNA no longer exists. According to the article it does indeed and has further control over territory than the ceremoniously proclaimed State of Palestine of 1988. For those wondering: if Britain or China suddenly decided to occupy the Republic of Ireland and Taiwan respectively with troops, artillery, etc., would that still make both Republics fully independent of the UK and the People's Republic or not? That is the question we are asking ourselves between Israel & Palestine. If we did force ourselves to adhere to every international and supranational guideline, we certainly would have included the Sovereign Military Order of Malta by now. Even the UN does not recognise Palestine as a member state but as an observer state. The only other UN observer state is the Holy See, which is (as a matter of fact) formatted similarly in regard to Vatican City. Whitewashing the PNA/Palestine as if there is already a two-state solution (with both nations living side-by-side in peace with one another) is the real culprit of WP:OR and is painfully unacceptable. We must adhere to fact via neutrality per WP:POV, however unbearable.--Neve–selbert 21:19, 9 March 2016 (UTC)
You have made these points before. They are still wrong and unhelpful.
  • Presenting information in a way that is consistent with the way reliable sources like ISO and the UN present information about Palestine is not WP:OR. To describe it as OR is simply incorrect and I cannot fathom how anyone familiar with Wikipedia's rules could make such a basic error.
  • It's not possible to reconcile the use of the word "whitewashing", which is about information hiding, with the existence of a footnote that explicitly describes the state of affairs in a way that is consistent with reliable sources by saying "The State of Palestine is a partially recognized state under Israeli occupation..." etc. A reasonable person might think that hiding information in structures whose intent is to convey unstated information implicitly is closer to the definition "whitewashing" in its effect if not its intent.
  • The status quo is not "unbearable", or anything else that implies an emotional state, it is just a sub-optimal and ineffective way of presenting information about Palestine. It uses a structure that reflects models of the real world in the minds of a tiny subset of Wikipedia editors rather than the way RS present information about Palestine.
  • One of Wikipedia's strengths is that its mandatory rules are designed to suppress the natural tendency to elevate oneself to the status of a reliable source and reduce the risk of content being degraded by various degrees of arrogance and ignorance. As an arrogant person who is ignorant of all but a tiny subset of the very large set of all known facts, I naturally despise arrogance and ignorance in others while regarding my own as perfectly fine. So it is fortunate that Wikipedia's rules constrain the many people like me so that we are not allowed to shape content to fit the flawed models of the real world that we carry around in our heads, remind us that we are not RS and ensure that we cannot just make things up because we like them and think they are good. Sean.hoyland - talk 06:33, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
Of course, I have reiterated several points, so I shall refrain from further repeating myself. The Rfc closes in around 48 hours anyway and the lack of consensus is blatantly and irrefutably evident between the parties. Moreover, to blindly take the words and actions of both the ISO & UN as gospel and dogma is also "wrong and unhelpful." Funnily enough, Palestine is not a full member of either organisation. One does wonder.--Neve–selbert 07:15, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
Wikipedia:What_is_consensus?#Not_unanimity, but my merits of arguments. One person can't filibuster improvement. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:20, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
How do you expect a reader uniformed of the layout to decipher what it means for a state to be a sub-entry of another? For the case of this list, everything than can be expressed visually can be expressed in text/colors with explanation and references. A strictly superior format with no ambiguities and no space for subjective interpretation. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:20, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

(edit conflicted with the above) My final say: At the moment, the listing of Palestine is potentially misleading but is clear on a close read and is consistent. ZBukov's stance on independence v sovereignty is a reasonable one - the best case that has been made for the current set up - but is still flawed, I think, for two reasons. First, if Palestine is not fully independent, then neither is it fully 'dependent/colonized'. There's still the issue, then, that this page only differentiates between entries such as Palestine and entries such as the Isle of Man through a wordy description which is not clear to the casual reader - it requires quite a close reading to note this difference. This is a flaw, and I don't quite see how people can not recognize this. Second, the my feeling is that the concept of 'independence' is much woollier than 'sovereignty', and while I can see the value in a 'leaders' page focusing on independence, there remains the question of how one defines this term; at least sovereignty is more readily defined by various reliable sources. I can only therefore conclude that this page would be improved by making the changes that Sean Hoyland has suggested for states which claim sovereignty. All that said, this page would be much worse if we only change Palestine. This removes one problem - a misleading but at least, on close inspection, accurate and consistent listing - and creates significant inconsistencies between entries with no basis in reliable sources and no rationale. There is no rule that an RfC has to stick rigidly to the initial question; the RfC has guided us, I think, to a series of other issues with the page beyond Palestine. I can't see how editors can see changing one problematic entry from a group as better than changing none; the current listing is only misleading; changing one makes the page more misleading and inconsistent to boot. I don't think that there's much else I can add. I look forward to watching what a closing admin decides.Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 10:25, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

Not all or nothing. Other entries need to be updated to get rid visual layout that is ambiguous and leaves space for subjective interpretation. Addressing Palestine entry is an incremental improvement that should be generalized to other entries, however, this is not subject of RfC. Feel free to create a new section to address other entries or wait till conclusion of RfC, and other entries can be addressed w.r.t. update to Palestine entry. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 10:34, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
This isn't an all or nothing argument, in that sense. What I'm arguing here is that doing some of the entries makes the article worse than doing none. We shouldn't be making the article worse, therefore, we shouldn't change Palestine alone. Entering a separate RfC for each entry is clearly a ridiculous waste of everyone's time, and there is nothing stating that an RfC has to stick strictly to the original question. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 11:31, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
Super Nintendo Chalmers Wouldn't we lose a relevant distinction by displaying every state that claims sovereignty the same way as those who actually have it? The challenge going by sovereignty rather than independence poses is that members of federal states possess some sovereignty, and the nature of the European Union also touches upon questions of sovereignty. But that's something we can choose to ignore. You are right in noting that currently there are three distinct groups on the list: recognized independent states, dependent territories, and states of unresolved or in-between status. If dependencies are distinguished both by font (lack of bold) and a description after their names, then a mere footnote for the third group appears to me too little - though there is clearly nothing objective or compelling about that.
Sean.hoyland How would you prefer to indicate whether a state is independent or not? Sorry if I missed it. ZBukov (talk) 12:00, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
I'm not fanatical about the current setup (evidently I don't own the article), but I think such a fundamental difference as independence or the lack thereof should be indicated in some salient way. That's why this solution was instituted originally, and this is why dependencies are listed under the country they belong to, if they are on the same continent as the "mother country" (e.g. see that Gibraltar is not placed according to the alphabetical order, but under the UK, one space further in, and Puerto Rico is under the USA). ZBukov (talk) 12:17, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
Yes, I think that makes sense for dependencies, and I feel these should stay - they fit well with the historical lists. With regards to arguments about sovereignty: some fair points, though in both cases one could (and many political scholars do) argue that sovereign states retain full sovereignty - they simply chose to delegate some of the associated associated power 'up' or 'down' - the UK can chose to leave the EU whether the EU wants it to or not; Catalonia cannot leave Spain without authorization of the Spanish state. With regards to differential listing: yes, I'd be in favour of there being some distinction. One option would be to list non-independent sovereign states out of alphabetical order, without bold text, underneath the 'controlling' state (effectively, the current set-up but without the indenting); to separate them out, perhaps within the continent or in a section of their own, leaders of non-independent states; or perhaps even them indented but the use of some symbol other than a bullet point, which more clearly differentiates them from dependencies? Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 15:17, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
With regards to consistency and changing one entry to make something worse, it's worth pointing out that Taiwan is currently shown without any distinction, so in the current set-up the treatment of what we usually consider as the states with limited recognition is already inconsistent for no reason visible on the page. On the wider point, with regards to the series this page is part of, it's also worth thinking about how historical entities are treated. The Confederate States of America, for example, whose independence was less stable than every entry in this list today, is listed separately with no distinctions. CMD (talk) 16:26, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

Shall I request an administrator to review this Rfc & then close it? GoodDay (talk) 12:27, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

@GoodDay: Only two days left—although there I doubt there is much harm in requesting a bit early. Although I must note, however, that consensus is quite foggy at the moment & hence a no consensus. Had Spirit Ethanol decided to take the correct route to edit resolution? Perhaps this discussion would have taken a different route also.--Neve–selbert 21:43, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
I'll request closure, tomorrow. It usually takes a little while, before such requests are responded to. GoodDay (talk) 21:47, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
User talk:Zoltan Bukovszky, the difference between the examples you give and Palestine, is that Palestine is not the dependency of a “mothercountry” in International Law, while Gibraltar and Puerto Rico are. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 16:55, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
Gerhard von Hebel the reason why I mentioned Gibraltar and Puerto Rico was that their lack of independence is saliently indicated in the list. The common point between them and Palestine is their lack of independence, not their dependency status under international law. ZBukov (talk) 21:52, 10 March 2016 (UTC)
But this is just your private explanation of what the indentation means. Readers who come to the page without your help don't have to understand it as you do. Your reason is not so good either, since the nature and source of the non-independence is vastly different between Palestine and Gibraltar. In fact there is no example of an indented state on the list whose circumstances are similar to those of Palestine. Incidentally, closure should be requested by posting a note on WP:AN, not by choosing an administrator. Zerotalk 00:12, 11 March 2016 (UTC)
FWIW, Kosovo is slightly similar to Palestine in terms of recognition—so any accusations of this list having a pro-Western, pro-USA bias are already out of the window. You know, I think most readers will come to the conclusion that the layout of the article directly and simply displays the inescapable fact that Israel is still (as of 2016) involved within the internal affairs and workings of Palestine/PNA, hence the occupation (considered too much information by the local community, although this could indeed change via further discussion outside an Rfc). Illegal or not—it does not matter, the 2003 invasion of Iraq was also considered illegal by the international community, et al. We shall not underestimate the intelligence of our readers. Moreover, the Rfc is due to formally expire in just over 24 hours.--Neve–selbert 06:47, 11 March 2016 (UTC)
Zero there are strong similarities between the status of Palestine and Western Sahara which is indented too (both have some diplomatic recognition, but no UN membership, they are under foreign occupation and they don't administer most of their territory). To my mind the most basic question about a country is if it's independent or not - which neither Gibraltar, nor Palestine is. The reasons are widely different, but the end result is the same (on this crude, binary level). ZBukov (talk) 09:43, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

I've requested an administrator 'review' & 'close' this Rfc :) GoodDay (talk) 04:57, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

Spirit Ethanol, why have extended this Rfc another 30 days? GoodDay (talk) 14:21, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

Discussion still ongoing, with possibly more editors who might want to weigh in. A request has already been made at WP:AN for RfC closure.. Spirit Ethanol (talk) 14:55, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
With an extra 30-days, the chances are greater that there'll be no consensus & thus the status quo will remain. I just found it strange, that you'd want to risk that. Anyways, it's your choice. GoodDay (talk) 15:01, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
It won't necessarily run for 30 more days. Reviewing admin closes RfC... Spirit Ethanol (talk) 15:03, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
Cool :) GoodDay (talk) 15:05, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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