The result was no consensus. There remains disagreement as to whether the framing of this article comprises WP:SYNTH. In addition to weaker arguments, editors arguing for deletion assert that the cited sources do not provide analyses of all three aspects--Zionism, race and genetics--together, particularly noting genetics as an often-missing element of studies of Zionism and race, or else allude to a WP:PAGEDECIDE situation where relevant information would be better covered as part of Zionism or another related article. Editors supporting keep argue that genetics is particularly important to the framing of many, if not necessarily all, of the studies analyzing race and Zionism, and assert that delete !voters are ignoring scholarly books/articles that do address all three topics in tandem but simply do not include the phrase verbatim in their title/abstract.
There seems to be a higher level of agreement (if not yet a consensus) that the current title is less-than-ideal, and that perhaps Zionism and racism (currently a redirect to a section of Racism in Israel), or some other expression of these topics, would be a more appropriate title. That can be taken up as a move request. signed, Rosguill talk 15:33, 19 July 2023 (UTC)
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Oh my, this article is ostensibly on a triply compound topic Zionism, race (human categorization) and genetics. Wow. To be clear, doubly compound topics in Wikipedia have had a history of being interrogated carefully. Only when there are significant and serious treatments which identify a compound topic as significantly addressed as a topic in reliable sources (Science and technology studies, for example) do we ever have a way for Wikipedia's intentionally conservative and non-innovative reference machinery to document the subject. In this case, the article reads a lot like a original research program that is not indicative of active tripartite treatments combining these three subjects. As such, the article is a textbook example of WP:SYNTH. It is not for Wikipedia. jps (talk) 18:42, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
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"As I argue through a reading of scientific studies of “the genetics of the Jews” published in the 1950s and 1960s, while Zionism presumed the existence of the Jewish people, the founding of the Jewish state put that ideological commitment to the test. What is evident in the work in Israeli population genetics is a desire to identify biological evidence for the presumption of a common Jewish peoplehood whose truth was hard to “see,” especially in the face of the arrival of oriental Jews whose presumably visible civilizational and phenotypic differences from the Ashkenazi elite strained the nationalist ideology upon which the state was founded. Testament to the legacy of racial thought in giving form to a Zionist vision of Jewish peoplehood by the mid-twentieth century, Israeli population researchers never doubted that biological facts of a shared origin did indeed exist, even as finding those facts remained forever elusive." |
pre-existing subject covered in numerous sourcesNo one has demonstrated that the subject as stated in the title of the article exists! It is bizarre that you think it does. As I stated above, compound topics themselves are fraught. The ones you are describing are somewhat less problematic than the identified synthetic subject of this article, but I have a hard time imagining any of them being legitimate research topics either. BLANK and BLANK typically are not the kind of things Wikipedia hosts because they are necessarily syntheses of two topics. Only when that synthesis is recognized as a synthesis do we host articles on the subject. I see no sources which identify these two topics (e.g. Zionism and "race science" (shudder)) as topics that are studied as a pair. jps (talk) 19:59, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
I see no sources which identify these two topics (e.g. Zionism and "race science" (shudder)) as topics that are studied as a pair.The third source posted by Onceinawhile above, a 30-year-old book published by Yale University Press, says at page 11:
In Chapter 6, I investigate the link between science and the politics of Zionism. Zionist physicians used the language of race science to define the Jewish people.... Levivich (talk) 20:25, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
Correspondingly, as the conflict of the Zionist State with the Arab world intensified, so did the wish to prove "scientifically," by biological-genetic means, the immanent physical, historic connection of the Jewish people to Zion. Genetics, it was hoped, would uphold not only the historical evidence, but would also provide biological evidence that the dispersed Jewish ethnic groups (eidoth) of today are indeed one people whose roots trace back to Eretz-Israel.)This book from 5 years ago cites and discusses at length the other book I quoted above from 30 years ago.
Jews were considered to be a different "race" -- a socio-cultural invention of a presumed "biological entity" ...If you are arguing that this book does not discuss Zionism, race, and genetics, then you clearly have not read or even searched it for those keywords. FFS, the title of the book is Zionism and the Biology of Jews, and you contend that this book does not discuss Zionism, race, and genetics. Rather unbelievable. Levivich (talk) 20:50, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
science or politics of race aren't equivalent to racismthis is true in a literal sense, but it is also the case that the science and politics of race essentially only exist because of the observed effects of racism. If racism did not exist, there would be no "science or politics of race". jps (talk) 12:14, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
At the outset of his Zionist activity, in July of 1895, Herzl met with the celebrated writer Max Nordau, who was to become Herzl’s most stalwart ally. Herzl noted in his diary that the two men agreed that Jewishness had “nothing to do with religion” but that “we are of the same race.” What they meant by race was vague, and could, as was common at the time, have been a way of describing what would later be called ethnicity. The conflation of ethnic and racialist discourse characterizes another diary en try, from 21 November 1895, in which Herzl describes Israel Zangwill as of a “longnosed, Negroid type, with very woolly deep black hair.” Despite this racialized description, Herzl posits that it was Zangwill, not himself, who defined peoples by racial criteria, a view that, Herzl writes, “I cannot accept if I so much look at him and at myself. … We are an historical unit, a nation with anthropological diversities. This also suffices for the Jewish State. No nation has uniformity of race.Derek Penslar,'Theodor Herzl, Race, and Empire,' 2020 p.196.
Titles containing "and" are often red flags that the article has neutrality problems or is engaging in original research: avoid the use of "and" in ways that appear biased.
In chapter 6, I investigate the link between science and the politics of Zionism. Zionist physicians used the language of race science to define the Jewish people...
The application of racial categories to the Jews by Zionist physicians and anthropologists in the first half of the twentieth century has been the focus of several recent studies.That was 14 years ago. "Zionist eugenics" == "Zionism, race, and genetics" because "eugenics" == "race and genetics".
Zionism’s new Jew was formed at the intersection of nineteenth and early twentieth-century race science/eugenics with romanticized, racialized, ethnic nationalisms."race science/eugenics" = "race and genetics". This entire section is about this. FFS, "The Birth of the Genomic Jew", is in the title. "Genomic Jew" = "race and genetics".
conflates race (socially constructed) with genetics (a subject of scientific study)... that's what eugenics is, it's a type of race science aka scientific racism. That's why these sources use those terms: Zionist eugenics, Zionist race science, Zionist scientific racism are all possible titles, as is Zionism, race, and genetics. But it's the same topic, it's about the intersection of scientific racism and Zionism, or, as the lead of the article says, various people have tried to use race pseudoscience (which includes genetic pseudoscience) to argue for or against Zionism. Levivich (talk) 16:02, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
"Sometimes two or more closely related or complementary concepts are most sensibly covered by a single article."The OP here may wish to note the use of the phrase "or more". Iskandar323 (talk) 06:24, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
Titles containing "and" are often red flags that the article has neutrality problems or is engaging in original research: avoid the use of "and" in ways that appear biased.Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 06:36, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
"Avoid the use of "and" to combine concepts that are not commonly combined in reliable sources."The concepts used in the title here are all commonly combined in legion reliable sources. And it's
"closely related or complementary concepts", and here the complementary nature of the topics is reliably sourced. Iskandar323 (talk) 07:02, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
Francis Nicosia has argued recently that secular and racial antisemitism generated a national-separatist Jewish response. And while civic emancipation and assimilation sapped Jewish religious identity, a more organic perception of nationhood began to crystallize. It incorporated ethnic and volkisch elements that were widespread in German nationalist circles These romantic elements, as demonstrated by George Mosse, strongly influenced nascent Zionist organizations throughout Germany. Since the early nineteenth century, the German concept of Volk had denoted a metaphys ical and eternal entity which was constituted of all the German people - a people with absolute values. It reflected the natural, wild, and emotional character of the people, while the family was regarded as its biological founda tion. The late nineteenth-century volkisch concepts were of neo-romantic mysticism and foregrounded the irrational forces of nature and genuine essence of the people, in contrast to the present, 'artificial' one. Among rising Jewish national groups this concept included the idea of a 'community of one's blood' as defined by Martin Buber, which helped to forge a Jewish national consciousness. Beyond the examination of the volkisch-cultural nature of early Zionism, several studies have considered the Jewish, and especially Zionist, discussion of race since the late nineteenth century. I might mention here the early research of Joachim Doron, Annegret Kiefer, and John Efron, while among recent studies the most relevant are those of Mitchell Hart, Todd Endelman, Raphael Falk, and Veronika Lipphardt. This work has exposed the 'scientific' racial aspects embedded in the emerging Jewish national ideology. Moreover, it contended that in particular Zionist scientists in Germany, and to some extent also in England, Russia, and the United States, employed the language of science and academic research in the fields of anthropology, biology, medicine and sociology in order to reaffirm the distinctiveness of the Jewish people.' Avraham 2017 p.473.
So the scandalized expostulations are totally misplaced. We don't censor here, we don't get our knickers in a twist over treatments of sensitive issues, screaming 'I don't wanna know!It would be better if you focussed on the actual arguments rather than the editors. This is not a WP:BATTLEGROUND. Suggest you read that through and strike the straw man and ad hominem lines. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:29, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
Titles containing "and" are often red flags that the article has neutrality problems or is engaging in original research: avoid the use of "and" in ways that appear biased.are exceptionally pertinent to the actual discussion. A title that focuses on one thing (e.g. Zionist eugenics) makes sense. A title that allows multiple issues to be conjoined, both scientific and pseudoscientific, is a recipe for... well, BATTLEGROUND behaviour. Don't you think? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:20, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
It is fair to say that a racialist orientation was fundamental to German Cultural Zionism… In this context, it is essential to distinguish carefully between "racialism" and "racism." Invariably, German Cultural Zionism presented a view of racial difference and uniqueness within the framework of the equality of races and the common dignity of all humans to develop their own potentialities within racial groupings. Racialist formulations which tended toward racism and claims of racial superiority of one race over others were avoided as a rule within Cultural Zionism.Onceinawhile (talk) 00:15, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
Comment by user now topic-banned and resulting discussion
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all of which state in Wikipedia's voice that modern Jews are descended from ancient Israelites. That might be true, and it is widely believed in popular consciousness, but it is certainly not the mainstream view amongst scholars and makes our project look crude and unsophisticated.This reads a bit cryptic to me and, I hope you know, this kind of statement has in the past been something that has fed directly into anti-Semitic conspiracy theories such as British Israelism, for example. Can you perhaps expand or clarify what you mean by this? jps (talk) 14:28, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
that modern Jews are descended from ancient Israelites... is certainly not the mainstream view amongst scholars. jps (talk) 20:54, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
some of these claimants are surely depending on similar flimsy genetic legacy ties. What makes a genetic legacy tie not flimsy? A critique of all genetic legacy ties would require a new definition of "descend" -- in which case, fair. But I'm a little perplexed by use of the term "proof" as though the context of this discussion is a courtroom or something. I guess the question is simple: Are we really to believe that the "mainstream view amongst scholars" that "Jews descended from ancient Israelites" is doubted? Even ideas such as the Khazar hypothesis of Ashkenazi ancestry or Shlomo Sand's appear to me to be at most minority views if not completely WP:FRINGE. Also, the existence of other claimants of descent from ancient Israelites are only relevant inasmuch as these claimants have played a zero-sum game with respect to the question (e.g. British Israelism). The Pashtuns may or may not descend from ancient Israelites, but their claim of such is not predicated on Jewish descent being incorrect. The question is not "who are all the people descended from the ancient Israelites?". The question is "are the Jews descended from the ancient Israelites?" jps (talk) 22:18, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
who are all the people descended from the ancient Israelitesbecomes an important one based on the premise of this article, and illustrates well why it should be kept. Because if the Zionist claim is based partly or mostly on genetics, then what is stopping any other group with a similar genetic argument to lay claim to lands they feel a connection with? What prevents an Englishman (or most of Britain?) who professes "Norman heritage" to lay claim to the northwest part of France and claim it for Britain?
... are the Jews descended from the ancient Israelites?The vast majority probably are, as are many of the Palestinians, but the question this article seeks to analyse is, how much of this descent idea was used to justify a Jewish nationalistic movement. Havradim leaf a message 03:15, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
"Meanwhile, it is important to inquire in detail into the fundamental problems of Zionism. The question of race has already been discussed, and we arrived at the conclusion that the alleged purity of the Jewish race is visionary and not substantiated by scientific observation. [Footnote: Max Nordau, an avowed disciple of Lombroso, knows that anthropological research has dissipated the notion of Jewish racial purity, but he places more confidence in the acute powers of observation of the street loafer who recognizes a Jew by his nose. "To be sure, the street loafer's diagnosis is not infallible, still it fails him only rarely. But then the scientific diagnosis is not always reliable. The acute eye of the street loafer," concludes Nordau, " is sufficient proof that the Jews are a race, or at least a variety, or, if you please, a sub-variety of mankind." (Le Siècle, 1899; Zionistische Schriften, p. 305). Zangwill asks, "Whoever heard of a religion that was limited to people of particular breed? Of divine truth that was only true for men of dark complexion?" (Jewish Chronicle, June 18th, 1909).]"The debate has evolved (into genetics) over the last century, but the same uncertainty remains.
Reverts made to enforce the 500/30 Rule are exempt from the provisions of this motion.So the IP is short the 500 rule and can be reverted. This article also certainly has to do with Israel. PackMecEng (talk) 18:34, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
The more articles like this are created, the more Wikipedia's credibility declines, and even worse: the sentiments portrayed in this article and similar ones, as well as the massive truth-bending, may actually inspire antisemitic hate speech, if not violence.Wikipedia becomes more, not less credible with the inclusion of research-based content. As for the second point, see WP:NOTCENSORED. Havradim leaf a message 18:55, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
‘All three ( Redcliffe Nathan Salaman, Shneor Zalman Bychowski and Fritz Shimon Bodenheimer) hoped to re-establish a Jewish entity within its ancient natural biological context in the name of universal human values. I suggest that this humanistic version of nationalism also allowed maintaining, especially among the practising Zionist writers, explicit racial and eugenic notions in spite of, and long after the inception of the ominous developments in Nazi Germany. These notions have persisted, though in a thinly disguised mode, in post-Second World War Israel. Above all, I suggest that the history of the relationship of Zionism and scientific biology, which has made an effort to single out Jews from non-Jews on the one hand, and to unite the distinct Jewish communities on the other hand, provides a problematic case of the utilisation of biological arguments as “evidence” for whatever social, economic, or political notion that has been put forward. During the hundred years since the establishment of political Zionism, the only logical and causative sequence that can be discerned is the one leading from the prejudices of the persons involved –Zionists and anti-Zionist alike-to whatever biological facts they choose to claim. And, in spite of the changing circumstances and contexts, the same old issues have been recycled again and again, where each side has utilised the evidence in its own way.Raphael Falk. Three Zionist Men of Science: Between Nature and Nurture, 2007 p.154.
All delete arguments are assuming...Try changing "all" to "no" and you will have a fairer summary. I feel like you are still talking past people here. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 15:16, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
...contemporary geneticists and their critics often consider similar questions and controversies such as those raised in pre-1980s studies based on blood groups, and even earlier biometric studies undertaken by 19th- and early-20th-century eugenicists and their critics. Zionist and anti-Zionist politics significantly inform historical and contemporary Jewish genetics literatures, at times explicitly and more often implicitly. In other words, they are stating explicitly that Zionism is a significant sub-topic of Jewish genetics and the prior related biometric (=race) science. I doubt we could find a better third party source to opine on this question of relative significance. Onceinawhile (talk) 12:08, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
And bear in mind that race and genetics are closely-connected topics, so this is A+[B1+B2]That is another contentious statement. Race is socially constructed, whereas genetics is not. At the interface of the discussion of race and genetics there is often a failure to acknowledge that genetics is clinal, a point that is right there in the lead of the page you linked to:
patterns of human variation have been shown to be mostly clinal, with human genetic code being approximately 99.9% identical between individuals, and with no clear boundaries between groups.And this is one excellent reason why we should not have another page that purports to be about something AND race AND genetics. Because we don't want the encylopaedia to unintentionally propagate the misunderstanding that race is closely connected to genetics. There is a relationship, and that is as far as it goes. Acquaintances but not bedfellows. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 15:44, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
we can turn anything into a humongous thread by expressing them and replying to everything everyone says, says the editor on his 25th reply in this thread, who feels the need to reply on every non-keep !vote. But does a significant body of academic literature conflate race and genetics? No! Look again. For instance, Falk (2017), much discussed above, argues that there is no scientific basis for Zionist eugenic claims, and that Jews are genetically just as diverse as any other population group. His argument is that the idea of a "Jewish race" is harmful and misleading. He avoids using the terms race and genetics together, and this is why he speaks of "The Biologization of Race" as a futile endeavour:
No wonder that against such a background, when the Nazis came to power, they had to mobilize their best anthropologists to identify – in vain – Jews in order to discriminate against them. Of course, soon they had to fall back on more straightforward devices to label Jews, such as the Yellow Patch.(Falk, 2017:30}. He argues against a Zionist Lamarckian driven eugenics, and so the question he is considering is eugenics. As Levivich notes, the author is a geneticist, and he brings his expertise to bear, but in so doing, his thesis is that race is not discernible in biology, and that the idea of a Jewish race is, as I say, harmful and misleading. He has been criticised for ignoring other historical-cultural aspects, but that is not his focus. He says:
(Falk, 2017:144) (emphasis mine). We should not allow the fact that he dismisses a concept of biological race through genetics and other means muddy the waters of an encyclopaedic article that purports to follow his thesis. He is discussing Zionist eugenics, and in so doing he brings genetics to bear. "race and genetics" do not go together in his thesis.The questions “what is a race?” or “who is a Jew?” largely ignore the fact that (within the human species) any marriage circle can be viewed as a potential race. Considering that any female and male of a species may produce progeny with other members of that species, the patterns of marriages or sexual relationships for humans, in general, are resolved not so much by biological determinants, but rather by geographic or socio-cultural affinities and barriers. Today it is common among researchers in the humanities, the social sciences, and even the natural sciences to say that at least as far as humans are concerned, (biological) races do not exist. The biological races that were presumably discovered were in fact the illegitimate product of the classification system imposed on nature. Classification by races is a social construct. As a rule, the use of the term “race” for multiplicity, which is based on the typological mind-set, has been pushed aside in the scientific parlance and replaced by “population” in terms of statistics
And bear in mind that race and genetics are closely-connected topics. I trust we see now that no, there is not a close connection between race and genetics, except inasmuch as it is in the mind of eugenicists and pseudoscientists. You have consistently mischaracterised this objection in this discussion, so the volume of information editors are being asked to consider is indeed large, but the discussion would go easier if there were less bludgeoning and more discussion. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 17:54, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
we don't want the encylopaedia to unintentionally propagate the misunderstanding that race is closely connected to geneticsI really don't think anyone is intentionally trying to do that and I think it is kinda hard to get that impression from the reworked opening para. This is not another page about Race and genetics. It is about genetics and racial concepts in Zionist thought. Selfstudier (talk) 16:42, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
In the early thirties a shift took place in the scientific discourse on racial mixture. William Provine defines it as a shift 'from condemnation to agnosticism' (1973: 794). It was partly the result of scientific developments. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, geneticists began to acknowledge the fact that human heredity was more complex than they had thought.Why is "genetics" placed in the title and lead? Rjjiii (talk) 04:41, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
"In contrast to the rest of the region, the history of genetic research on Jews in Israel has been relatively well studied. Historians and anthropologists have critically examined how the structuring assumptions of Jewish race science in early-twentieth-century Europe and North America, and their relationship to Zionist nationalism, reverberate within the genetic studies of Jewish populations by Israeli scientists from the 1950s to the present."; Baker 2017, p.105
“Like Zionism’s new Jew that emerged from nineteenth-century European race science, the genomic Jew, a product of “population genetics,” springs from the same milieu”and Ostrer 2012, p.33
“Often, race science and Zionism went hand-in-hand, and the identification of a Jewish race provided justification for an ancestral homeland… The issues that preoccupied the Jewish intellectual leaders of 1911 are the same ones that preoccupy the leaders of today. Who are the Jews, a religious group or a genetic isolate? Did they originate from Middle Eastern matriarchs and patriarchs? Fishberg lacked the tools for answering these questions. The genetic methods that would eventually provide answers were starting to develop in Fishberg's New York in the Columbia University laboratory of Thomas Hunt Morgan. The precision of these genetic tools continued to improve over the course of the twentieth century, and as they did, Fishberg's intellectual heirs sought to apply them to the issues of Jewish origins and identity.”Onceinawhile (talk) 06:25, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
seemingly that genetic studies of Jews are tied to antiquated racial beliefs and run by ideologues
Chaim Sheba,Sheba is a good example of what I noted above- that many doctors in post-war Israel had been trained in the German sphere, and quite a few never quite threw off some of the earlier premises of race science standard in curricula who became director general of the Health Ministry in 1950, argued, according to a 2005 report that “a high concentration of those ill in body and soul would jeopardize the future of Jewish community in Israel. To support his argument, he used examples from genetic theories which purported to show national gene pools weakened through a lack of genetic vigilance.” Sheba was influential in temporarily preventing Cochin Jews from immigrating. The communist newspaper Davar asserted that a community “with numerous sick, decadent, unrestrained elements will not withstand the social and security test.” Haaretz writer Arieh Gledblum claimed in 1950 that North African Jews’ “primitivism is unsurpassed…. They have little talent for comprehending anything intellectual” and “lack any roots in Judaism.”(Seth Frantzman, 'Israel’s Uncomfortable History of Racist Engineering,' The Forward 21 April 2014
and thus whether it is already covered by other articlesOnly one editor has alleged a fork, afaics. Here is another source for your interest, note the title:-
Which parts of Falk book is criticized as polemic and by who?I can't find the criticism about it being too polemical. It would have been a review of his book. I have struck the comment as it may be misremembered, and in any case is unimportant. Shlomo Sand referred to conceptual weaknesses, but also approves of much of the work. For instance in The Invention of the Jewish People, page 266. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:09, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
It is that in more recent times that throws in the subject of genetic science and then changes the article from a discussion of the Zionist thinking to opposition of Zionist goals as well as a broader discussion of questions of descent.In the late 19th century, a discourse emerged in Zionist thinking seeking to reframe conceptions of Jewishness in terms of racial identity and race science. In more recent times, genetic science generally and Jewish population genetics in particular have been used in support of or opposition to Zionist political goals, including claims of Jewish ethnic unity and descent linked to the biblical Land of Israel.
I’m not seeing that in the article, which is about how both are influenced by ZionismUh huh, this article is Zionism, race and genetics which is about how both are influenced by Zionism, right? Falk says that Zionist ideology persisted (Falk "especially among the practising Zionist writers, explicit racial and eugenic notions in spite of, and long after the inception of the ominous developments in Nazi Germany. These notions have persisted, though in a thinly disguised mode, in post-Second World War Israel.· and this latest source is saying similar, as you have just acknowledged. Trying to make the discussion about something else isn't going to help. Selfstudier (talk) 16:42, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
OT discussion about AE
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