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 | Hezbollah was nominated as a good article, but it did not meet the good article criteria at the time (August 12, 2006). There are suggestions below for improving the article. If you can improve it, please do; it may then be renominated. |
 | This page is not a forum for general discussion about Hezbollah. Any such comments may be removed or refactored. Please limit discussion to improvement of this article. You may wish to ask factual questions about Hezbollah at the Reference desk. |
Vandalism?
The first section of this page is "# 1 95% of terrorists are musilm". There's no content to go along with that section and no cited source, so it seems like it's some lame attempt at vandalism. I haven't removed the section because I wanted to raise the issue. Maybe topics such as these should have a small degree of moderation?
- I don't see any such quote. --GHcool 17:35, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
Designation as a terrorist organization
I guess there is enough information about this issue in the lead and intro. So we can move Hezbollah#Designation as a terrorist organization and Hezbollah#Non Governmental Organizations to a new article and shorten this article . Do you agree with me.--Sa.vakilian 17:19, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
- I disagree. These two sections are essential to even a basic understanding of Hezbollah. --GHcool 18:56, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
The terrorist designation seems to be a minority world view.
- Just because a nation (or even many nations) doesn't officially list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization does not mean that they are not one. --GHcool 05:49, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
A basic understanding of Israel would be to mention in the Israel article that the majority of the world's nations consider Israel a racist nation. Not every country calls Israel rascist but that doesn't mean it isn't.
Since one of the basic tenants of Hezollah is the destruction of Israel and Hezbollah is not a soviergn nation, the labeling of terrorist should be put in the header. If Hezbollah was a nation than their attacks could be considered an act of war.Skypad 19:28, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
al-Mahdi Scouts
Fox News on January 1, 2007 had a report on the al-Mahdi Scouts, a youth wing of the Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. The really interesting thing is, outwardly, they look very much like traditional Scouts, with the normal uniforms (light and medium blue, white, yellow and purple for different groups) and badges and all. The flags being flown from cars and along the roadside showed the emblem, again a traditional fleur-de-lis, whose petals are left-to-right green/white/red, and in the top center of which is a hand with an out-turned palm, possibly the Hand of Fatima, and supported on left and right by single scimitars. Can anyone support/document this? In itself it would be a most interesting article. Chris 07:19, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
Clean Up
I removed [[Category:Cleanup from August 2006]]. Please pay attention to the article and especially the links. If you find it need to clean up, then put it in the category again. --Sa.vakilian 03:45, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
[[Category:Hezbollah]]
I think we should improve this category. I suggest to merge [[Category:Wars of Hezbollah]] with [[Category:Battles involving Hezbollah]]. Also [[Category:Secretaries-general of Hezbollah]] has few articles to become a category and we can make [[Category:members of Hezbollah]] instead. There are some articles in [[Category:Hezbollah]] which doesn't relate in it like Kurdish Revolutionary Hezbollah.--Sa.vakilian 04:36, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
- I agree. --GHcool 05:50, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
- Please wait until User:Kirill Lokshin tell us his idea. He is involved in this issue. I put a comment for him.--Sa.vakilian 15:42, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
- I don't particularly care one way or the other, frankly. Kirill Lokshin 17:22, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
I did something and I guess somebody will come here to see this discussion.--Sa.vakilian 04:43, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
"Hezbollah operates based on the following ..."
Someone recently added a numbered and bulleted list under the "Position on use of armed strength to achieve aims" heading that is unsourced and has the air of Original Research. Does anyone agree? If nobody responds to this in one week, I will delete the list. --GHcool 20:08, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
- I found some of those points in official documents of Hezbollah but I don't have enough time to work on it. Could you please do it on the basis of Statement of purpose , Hizbullah: Views and Concepts and A Voice of Resistance: the Point of View of Hizballah --Sa.vakilian 04:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
Too long
Someone has reinseted the "This article is becoming very long" tag. I've trimmed the article quite a bit to try to accomodate. If anyone has an issue about the things I trimmed, feel free to talk about it here or to reinsert it. Also, if anybody has any other ideas about things that can be trimmed, this would be the place to talk about it. --GHcool 22:45, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
- I put that tag but I don't have enough time to help with it. I'll return next mounth and try to improve it.--Sa.vakilian 10:11, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
- I returned. I have reverted some of your editions. [1]. I think we should discuss about them.--Sa.vakilian 17:25, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
Destruction of Israel references
Could you please verify guys if this ref link is working? It is a blank page. I removed this ref as nothing is mentioned about the "destruction of Israel" there. -- Szvest - Wiki me up ® 12:14, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
- The ICT link is a blank page for me also. This has happened before with ICT links.. mceder (u t c) 15:46, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
In the Reference portion, there are some website links that are very long, those two links probably make up 1/5 or more of the article's length.
- We can move them to sub-articles depend on their issues.--Sa.vakilian 15:32, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
- I moved or deleted about 10 external links but it didn't have any effect on the length of the article and it's 95kb.--Sa.vakilian 06:11, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
2006–2007 Lebanese anti-government revolt
I copied a summary of the lead of 2006–2007 Lebanese anti-government revolt in Hezbollah#Political activities because of current events. I'll move it to Hezbollah political activities when the situation become calm.--Sa.vakilian 03:09, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
Long lead
I think we don't need to write everything in the lead. Thus I move Hezbollah's goals to the ideology and leave a summary in the lead.--Sa.vakilian 07:50, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
- Terrorism is not as prominant as it should be in the lead. If Hezbollah was only a political party, it would not be in the news that much. Terrorists should be in the first paragraph.Reapor2 16:12, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
- I believe that such a change would equate to redeveloping a POV-pushing war within the article. --Kukini 20:29, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Nowadays Hezbollah has found building Islamic state is not available in Lebanon and has abandoned it in practice
Hi, this sentence is problematic for two reasons: 1) it is based on a thin NYTIMES reviw of books cite 2) the english sounds a little funny (I really don't want to insult anyone's efforts here, I really aplaud the non-native english speaking crowd for doing such an outstanding job in writing in english here). The use of the word "available" is awkward here. How about, "Hez. has realized the goal of transforming Lebanon into an Islamic state is not a practical one and has abandoned it" or something like that?. I'm not saying that Hez DOES want to bulild an Islamic state in Lebanon, but is there better evidence that it does not other than this one cite? Elizmr 19:29, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
- You're correct. My English is not so good and I yhank you for your help. I agree with your sentence but I don't understand why NYtimes isn't reliable. I remember in the past we used BBC but that source doesn't represent hezbollah POV.--Sa.vakilian 03:19, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- Yeah, I like the way Elizmr worded it as well, but I think it should read "Hez. has realized the goal of transforming Lebanon into an Islamic state is not a practical one and has abandoned it for the time being." As for the source, I think The New York Times Review of Books is pretty reliable, but there are equally reliable sources that make the opposite claim. --GHcool 03:45, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- SaVa, your English is really good for a non-native speaker. I am concerned that this is a big point, however, and if there are sources which make claims in both directions, then I think maybe we should not have this particilar assertaion in the lead. Elizmr 04:21, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- As I read Hezbollah wanted to build Islamic state until 1992. But it has changed its goal since that time. Now it wants one person-one vote system because Shi'a is the biggest minorityin Lebanon. But it doesn't want to remove Sunni and Christians from political scene. I have many sources for this claim but NYtimes is reliable because it has quoted Nasrallah POV in this case. GHcool says there are reliable sources that make the opposite claim. I think we should separate ideological POV from practical one. Hezbollah believe in building Islamic state like Iran but according to Nasrallah it's impossible so in practice Hezbollah has abandoned it. When I asked Nasrallah about his views on an Islamic state, he said, "We believe the requirement for an Islamic state is to have an overwhelming popular desire, and we're not talking about fifty percent plus one, but a large majority. And this is not available in Lebanon and probably never will be"[2] . --Sa.vakilian 06:50, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- I still think that the clause "for the time being" must be inserted. I see Nasrallah's words quoted by Sa.vakilian and the New York Times Review of Books as a modus tollens:
- (1) If there is "an overwhelming popular desire" within Lebanon to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state, then Hezbollah will champion the cause to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state."
- (2) There is not an "overwhenlming popular desire" within Lebanon to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state.
- Therefore, (3) Hezbollah will not champion the cause to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state.
- As any student of philosophy knows, and as I am sure Nasrallah also knows, a modus tollens can easily be converted into a modus ponens in a situation in which the truth value of "If" statement in Premise #1 changes:
- (1) If there is "an overwhelming popular desire" within Lebanon to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state, then Hezbollah will champion the cause to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state."
- (2) There is an "overwhenlming popular desire" within Lebanon to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state.
- Therefore, (3) Hezbollah will champion the cause to turn Lebanon into an Islamic state.
- I still think that the clause "for the time being" must be inserted. I see Nasrallah's words quoted by Sa.vakilian and the New York Times Review of Books as a modus tollens:
- As I read Hezbollah wanted to build Islamic state until 1992. But it has changed its goal since that time. Now it wants one person-one vote system because Shi'a is the biggest minorityin Lebanon. But it doesn't want to remove Sunni and Christians from political scene. I have many sources for this claim but NYtimes is reliable because it has quoted Nasrallah POV in this case. GHcool says there are reliable sources that make the opposite claim. I think we should separate ideological POV from practical one. Hezbollah believe in building Islamic state like Iran but according to Nasrallah it's impossible so in practice Hezbollah has abandoned it. When I asked Nasrallah about his views on an Islamic state, he said, "We believe the requirement for an Islamic state is to have an overwhelming popular desire, and we're not talking about fifty percent plus one, but a large majority. And this is not available in Lebanon and probably never will be"[2] . --Sa.vakilian 06:50, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- SaVa, your English is really good for a non-native speaker. I am concerned that this is a big point, however, and if there are sources which make claims in both directions, then I think maybe we should not have this particilar assertaion in the lead. Elizmr 04:21, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
--GHcool 07:38, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- Yes. Of course. But why do you speak so difficult. Hezbollah is eager to do so but situation isn't appropriate.Thus in practice Hezbollah has abandoned it--Sa.vakilian 10:52, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- I imagine my above post must have been difficult for a non-native English speaker to understand. For that, I appologize. Your grasp of English is very impressive, Sa.vakilian. That being said, I agree that they have abandoned it in practice for now. They are keeping the desire for an Islamic state in Lebanon "in the ice box" until an appropriate time to thaw it and turn it into a reality. This should be reflected in the statement in the introduction. --GHcool 17:12, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- Yes. Of course. But why do you speak so difficult. Hezbollah is eager to do so but situation isn't appropriate.Thus in practice Hezbollah has abandoned it--Sa.vakilian 10:52, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
Sava, I see that the word use "available" was Nasrallah's, not yours! :=) To further clarify what GHcool says above, I think there is a huge difference in meaning between these two scenarios:
- 1) Hezbollah has abandoned the goal of turning Lebanon into an Islamic state because the organization has decided that an Islamic state would not be an appropriate form of government for Lebanon
and
- 2) Hezbollah still firmly believes that Lebanon should be an Islamic state, but realizes that the goal is an impractical one at the present time
I think that the second scenario is closer to the truth based on the quote from Nasrallah, but the text as it is (to a Western audience) has the risk of implying #1. I suggest that we therefore change the sentence to, "Hez. has realized the goal of transforming Lebanon into an Islamic state is not practical at the present time and has temporarily abandoned it". Elizmr 19:07, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- Sounds good to me. --GHcool 20:16, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- 2 is certainly closer to the truth, but I think "at the present time" is too weak. Preferably, we should indicate what HA's conditions are. Have we not had this discussion before? I have a terrible sense of déjà-vu... Palmiro | Talk 23:17, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
- Palmiro could you say specifically what you suggest for wording? And, yes, i share the deja-vu (ie the sensation that we've been here before) but the sentence is still in the article. Elizmr 01:01, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
Great achievement
I could shorten this article about 7kb by making new article and moving some part of it to Funding of Hezbollah. I hope it doesn't annoy anybody.--Sa.vakilian 06:27, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
- Yeah, that was good. Thanks. --GHcool 20:53, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
- A long-waited action. Thanks sa.vakilian. -- Szvest - Wiki me up ® 20:33, 1 February 2007 (UTC)