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Revision as of 15:42, 10 July 2023 editOnceinawhile (talk | contribs)Autopatrolled, Extended confirmed users, Pending changes reviewers49,730 edits →Tag bombing?: new sectionTag: New topic← Previous edit Revision as of 15:43, 10 July 2023 edit undoOnceinawhile (talk | contribs)Autopatrolled, Extended confirmed users, Pending changes reviewers49,730 edits →Non Neutral, Synthesis, Factually Inaccurate: ReplyTag: ReplyNext edit →
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::::::Article has been tagged synth and a section as well, which is it? ] (]) 15:38, 10 July 2023 (UTC) ::::::Article has been tagged synth and a section as well, which is it? ] (]) 15:38, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
:::::::The article is synth on both a micro and macro level. There is synth occuring within single sentences, within paragraphs, and the article as a whole is a cherry-picked, POV-Fork conglomeration of synth. ] (]) 15:40, 10 July 2023 (UTC) :::::::The article is synth on both a micro and macro level. There is synth occuring within single sentences, within paragraphs, and the article as a whole is a cherry-picked, POV-Fork conglomeration of synth. ] (]) 15:40, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
::::::::Once again, please provide sourced evidence for these claims. ] (]) 15:43, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


== Broken reference == == Broken reference ==

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Possible sources

MIT Press 2021 ISBN 10:0262542943 Genomic Citizenship: The Molecularization of Identity in the Contemporary Middle East McGonigle, Ian Ch 2 The “nature” of Israeli citizenship

"Population analysis by geneticists has led to an unresolved debate over Jewish origins (Abu El-Haj 2012; Elhaik 2012; Kohler 2014). Geneticists have begun to describe the genetic basis for common ancestry of the whole of the Jewish population (Behar et al. 2010), even though the historical claims that are entangled with these scientific studies are still contested. One of the most contentious claims made is that European Jews are descended from converts to Judaism from the Khazar Empire, which covered much of Eastern Europe during the second half of the first century CE (Koestler 1976; Sand 2009; Wheelwright 2013). Some rabbis and several population geneticists instead claim that there is a direct line of descent connecting most European Jews to the biblical land of Israel (Sand 2009).2 But Israeli historian Shlomo Sand argues, “The Jews have always comprised significant religious communities that appeared and settled in various parts of the world, rather than an ethnos that shared a single origin and wandered in a permanent exile” (2009, 22) Selfstudier (talk) 17:52, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

Title

Maybe Zionism and Jewish genetics? Selfstudier (talk) 18:10, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

The word "race" in the title gives a wider scope - population genetics in this way didn't begin until after Watson and Crick in the 50s. Prior to the 1940s the Zionist discourse of this nature was about race. Onceinawhile (talk) 19:20, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

NPOV Issues

This article has multiple NPOV issues:

  1. It largely ignores the widely held conventional view, which is that the majority of Jewish ethnic groups have common ancestry from the ancient Middle East. This view is currently supported by the majority of genetic studies, as well as recent research linking the major Jewish groups to ancient Canaanite DNA and other modern Levantine populations.
  2. It uses a questionable 1974 article (Haddad, Hassan S. (1974). "The Biblical Bases of Zionist Colonialism". Journal of Palestine Studies. . 3 (4): 98-99) whose relevance for the topic, reliability and neutrality are currently being discussed on another article, Zionism, (see Talk:Zionism#Question) after the same editor added it there and was immediately challenged; Here, it is added without offering any opposing viewpoints, ignoring the issues brought up in the aforementioned discussion. Tombah (talk) 19:02, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
Thanks Tombah. On 1., the article says "It is likely that many modern Jews have at least one ancestral line from Levant". What more do you want?
On 2. if you think the article is "questionable" I suggest you raise it at RSN. On the other talk discussion you are referring to, it was established that Haddad was a distinguished professor at Saint Xavier University. Anyway, it is being used in a different way here, so if you wish to oppose its use here you will need to explain. Onceinawhile (talk) 19:17, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
For point #1, no sources have been presented establishing this claim of a "widely held conventional view", while, on the contrary, the page contains several sources that establish quite a separate and contrasting narrative. If there is an alternative perspective, source it. In the discussion of Haddad, that material is unbalanced likewise simply calls for other sources to be added to balance it. Iskandar323 (talk) 19:26, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
For point #1, The ancestral connection between Jews and the ancient Middle East is supported by a vast body of genetic scientific research. This topic is already covered in depth in our articles on Genetic studies on Jews with many RS mentioning shared ancestry derived from the ancient Middle East; the Middle Eastern descent of Ashkenazis in particular, totally ignored by this article; genetic heritage of the Canaanites that lives on in Jewish and non-Jewish Levantine populations; similarity to other Levantine groups, with articles touching on the relations between Palestinians and Jewish divisions (here), the connection between Lebanese, Palestinians and Sephardic Jews, described in one article as "three Near-Eastern populations sharing a common geographic origin", Samaritans and Jews, etc. You ask me to demonstrate that 1+1 is 2.
For #2, do you claim that the view that Zionism is colonialism is universally accepted? We all know it is one point of view among many, usually held by anti-Zionists. That makes it problematic to base large parts of this article on that source, and that is a violation of WP:NPOV. Tombah (talk) 11:15, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

References

  1. Carmi S, Hui KY, Kochav E, Liu X, Xue J, Grady F, Guha S, Upadhyay K, Ben-Avraham D, Mukherjee S, Bowen BM, Thomas T, Vijai J, Cruts M, Froyen G, Lambrechts D, Plaisance S, Van Broeckhoven C, Van Damme P, Van Marck H, Barzilai N, Darvasi A, Offit K, Bressman S, Ozelius LJ, Peter I, Cho JH, Ostrer H, Atzmon G, Clark LN, Lencz T, Pe'er I (September 2014). "Sequencing an Ashkenazi reference panel supports population-targeted personal genomics and illuminates Jewish and European origins". Nature Communications. 5: 4835. Bibcode:2014NatCo...5.4835C. doi:10.1038/ncomms5835. PMC 4164776. PMID 25203624.
  2. Agranat-Tamir L, Waldman S, Martin MS, Gokhman D, Mishol N, Eshel T, Cheronet O, Rohland N, Mallick S, Adamski N, Lawson AM, Mah M, Michel MM, Oppenheimer J, Stewardson K, Candilio F, Keating D, Gamarra B, Tzur S, Novak M, Kalisher R, Bechar S, Eshed V, Kennett DJ, Faerman M, Yahalom-Mack N, Monge JM, Govrin Y, Erel Y, Yakir B, Pinhasi R, Carmi S, Finkelstein I, Reich D (May 2020). "The Genomic History of the Bronze Age Southern Levant". Cell. 181 (5): 1153–1154. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2020.04.024. PMID 32470400.
  3. Lucotte, Gérard; Mercier, Géraldine (1 January 2003). "Y-chromosome DNA haplotypes in Jews: comparisons with Lebanese and Palestinians". Genet. Test. 7 (1): 67–71. doi:10.1089/109065703321560976. PMID 12820706.
  4. Shen P, Lavi T, Kivisild T, Chou V, Sengun D, Gefel D, Shpirer I, Woolf E, Hillel J, Feldman MW, Oefner PJ (September 2004). "Reconstruction of patrilineages and matrilineages of Samaritans and other Israeli populations from Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA sequence variation". Human Mutation. 24 (3): 248–60. doi:10.1002/humu.20077. PMID 15300852. S2CID 1571356.
@Tombah:
1. The point is already made in the article. It is made dispassionately, not described as "conventional" as you do, because we would need a source for this.
2. The source is used for just one sentence, and how now been watered down with in-line attribution.
Onceinawhile (talk) 06:31, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Comment

Interestingly enough, according to one article, While several non-Palestinian writers in the Arab world included the Israelites among the ancient Semitic peoples, Palestinian writers rejected this notion, since it might have given some credence to the Jewish link to Palestine. They resolved this conflict by denying any historical link between the ancient Hebrews and modern Jews, describing the latter as descendants of the Caucasian Khazar nation that had adopted Judaism during the eighth century, or as an amalgamation of people from various ethnic groups who had embraced Judaism in the course of the past two thousand years. Litvak, Meir (1994). "A Palestinian Past: National Construction and Reconstruction". History and Memory. 6 (2): 24–56. ISSN 0935-560X. I'm (almost) surprised to see elements of Palestinian propaganda on Misplaced Pages as well. Tombah (talk) 11:26, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

WP:FORUM, a "Comment" in response to what exactly? Place this in context of improvement to the article, please. Selfstudier (talk) 11:52, 9 July 2023 (UTC)
Comment on this piece as a whole, which is starting to resemble not only an anti-Zionist essay but also starts to bear a faint smell of antisemitism due to enormous cherry-picking of sources, WP:SYNTH editing, and denial of evidence, now even claiming that all studies involved with Jews should be disputed because their reliability might be impacted by the authors' "Zionist" attitudes. Tombah (talk) 06:48, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
More non responsive WP:FORUM and evidence free assertion.Selfstudier (talk) 11:12, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Fully agree, the article attempts to insinuate through synthesis that mainstream genetic research is "Zionist". While going back and forth between "Zionist" and "Jewish" in a way that is unsettling. The entire concept of the article "Zionism, race and genetics", is not a real thing, and is an invention of this article purely through synthDrsmoo (talk) 13:14, 10 July 2023 (UTC) Moved to own section Drsmoo (talk) 13:27, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Recent revert

@Drsmoo: please explain this revert, with your edit comment "Not in source, the phrase “Jewish scientific racism” could be construed as antisemitic":

  • OLD TEXT: "The connection between Zionism and early 20th century Jewish scientific racism and, since the 1950s, genetic science, has been widely studied by historians and anthropologists."
  • Drsmoo TEXT: "The connection between Zionism and early 20th century genetic science, has been widely studied by historians and anthropologists."
  • ORIGINAL SOURCE QUOTE: "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."

Your edit changed the meaning - there was no "early 20th century genetic science" relating to this topic. Early 20th century race science is one topic, and genetic studies from the 1950s to the present, is another.

And our article scientific racism states that the term "race science" (used in the original source above) is a synonym used by its proponents. Onceinawhile (talk) 22:55, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

The source doesn’t call the studies racist, nor does it call them pseudoscientific. The phrase “Jewish Scientific Racism”, which seems to have been invented in this article, sounds eerily similar to the Nazi term “Jewish physics”. I will undo my revert now per 1RR, but will remove it again once ruled permit. Drsmoo (talk) 23:32, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
Shall we just change "scientific racism" to "race science" then? Onceinawhile (talk) 23:44, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
Yes Drsmoo (talk) 00:15, 9 July 2023 (UTC)
"Jewish race science" is disturbing as well though. Drsmoo (talk) 13:18, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Ruppin

  • There are quite a number of views that emphasized Jews as a mixed 'race'. Herzl proposed that. See the Mauschel page.
  • A key thinker here was Arthur Ruppin, whose views I've sketched out here.

Nishidani (talk) 23:11, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

Interesting, thanks. Two points for additional sub-topics in this article come to mind reading that:
(1) the classification of Jewish groups by early Zionists could be covered here (e.g. Anat Leibler, “Disciplining Ethnicity: Social Sorting Intersects with Political Demography in Israel’s Pre-State Period,” Social Studies of Science 44, no. 2 (2014), p. 273.); and
(2) Zionist views of Palestinian race / genetics could fit here too.
Onceinawhile (talk) 23:51, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Misplaced Pages talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: rejected by reviewer, closed by Narutolovehinata5 (talk) 14:43, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

( )
  • ... that the genetic origin of modern Jews is considered important within Zionism, as it seeks to provide a historical basis for the belief that descendants of biblical Jews have "returned"? Source: McGonigle, Ian V. (2021). Genomic Citizenship: The Molecularization of Identity in the Contemporary Middle East. MIT Press (originally a Harvard PhD Thesis, published March 2018). p. 36 (c.f. p.54 of PhD). ISBN 978-0-262-36669-4. Retrieved 2023-07-08. The stakes in the debate over Jewish origins are high, however, since the founding narrative of the Israeli state is based on exilic 'return.' If European Jews have descended from converts, the Zionist project falls prey to the pejorative categorization as 'settler colonialism' pursued under false assumptions, playing into the hands of Israel's critics and fueling the indignation of the displaced and stateless Palestinian people. The politics of 'Jewish genetics' is consequently fierce. But irrespective of philosophical questions of the indexical power or validity of genetic tests for Jewishness, and indeed the historical basis of a Jewish population 'returning' to the Levant, the Realpolitik of Jewishness as a measurable biological category could also impinge on access to basic rights and citizenship within Israel.

Created by Onceinawhile (talk). Self-nominated at 07:35, 9 July 2023 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Zionism, race and genetics; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

  • Article is new enough and long enough. However, it's the subject of a POV flag and there's ongoing debate on the talk page about the article's WP:NPOV. Indeed, the article's (lengthy) lede section largely pulls from 2 journal articles that seem to not represent scholarly consensus to frame the discussion. Hook is interested, but the cited source seems to be one scholar's opinion, rather than a fact. Would suggest waiting to have more editors, especially with more specialized subject matter expertise than I, weigh in on the matter at hand in the article. Longhornsg (talk) 08:07, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Hi Longhornsg thanks for your comment. Since you have an interest in the subject of Jewish History (WikiProject), please could you comment on the article talk page and help develop the article there? Your comments above seem intended to cast doubt (“seem to not… seem to be”), which is helpful if you are willing to provide the evidence underpinning your uncertainty. Onceinawhile (talk) 11:43, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Article is a transparent attempt to portray studies on Jewish Genetics as "Zionist" and thereby ideological/untrustworthy, without any source actually describing the studes as such. The article itself is full of Synth and assertions that are not actually in the sources. The article should be deleted, and certainly not featured on a "Did you know". Drsmoo (talk) 13:54, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Note: the above editor has been adding various tags to the article. When challenged to explain the above claims he wrote: Allegations of bias and synth in a[REDACTED] article are not substantiated by scholarly reliable sources, they are an individual judgement. The observation that an article combines disparate ideas to push an original viewpoint is not something that would be sourced. Onceinawhile (talk) 16:07, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
After the allegations of bias were substantiated, the above editor and a supporting editor asked me to provide "sources" to prove that the article was biased/Synth. As if it has been subject to a scholarly peer review and JSTOR had articles about this wiki page. Drsmoo (talk) 16:22, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
I archived reference to this nomination on the article's (very crowded) talk page as I assumed the conversation was over but that was reverted as it has not been closed. I oppose the nomination for the moment. The article is very unstable and has been under heavy dispute. Although the contention is starting to quieten, the article is nowhere near consensus-approved enough to feature. There has been a conversation for nearly two months over whether it needs to be renamed, for example. BobFromBrockley (talk) 08:51, 24 August 2023 (UTC)
  • The article's neutrality has been in dispute for over a month at this point, and the prior reviewer's assessment still seems largely correct. It reads like an essay on a particular aspect of race science, and issues are still being identified (for example, an editor just today was removing close paraphrasing from sources). The talk page still has active disputes regarding the content and presentation of perspectives. All together, I doubt that this article is "reasonably complete and not some sort of work in progress". Not presentable and given the time spent already, I find it unlikely that it will become presentable in a reasonable time frame for DYK. — Wug·a·po·des 21:51, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Anti-Zionism and the scale of the modern Jewish connection

Reading some lower quality media on this matter, there seems to be a common strawman argument along the following lines:

  • Statement: "Modern Jews may not be primarily descended from ancient Israelites"
  • Response: "You are denying there is a connection between modern Jews and the Israelites"

"May not be primarily descended from" and "there is connection between" are very different thresholds.

We must be careful to keep an eye on this nuance. It is not tenable to suggest that mainstream Palestinians or anti-Zionists deny all "connection" - it is patently clear that a connection exists, culturally and probably biologically. The only debate is over the scale of this connection, and in particular whether this connection to the land is stronger than the connection that the Palestinians have.

Onceinawhile (talk) 06:47, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

@Tombah: to address your most recent revert, you are referring to Meir Litvak, page 29, whose source for the claim is shown in footnote 24: 24 Chejne, "The Use of History," 395; Joshua Teitelbaum, "The Palestine Liberation Organization," Middle East Contemporary Survey (1990): 212; "A Comprehensive Interview with the Hamas Leadership," Filastin al Muslima, Apr. 1990; al-Hadaf 30 May 1993.
Chejne's article doesn't mention Jews once (it is being used to support the first part of Litvak's paragraph). So Litvak's claim is referring explicitly to the claims by the PLO and Hamas. Firebrand politicians' views do not represent the "mainstream Palestinian" view, and should not be presented as such. Onceinawhile (talk) 06:59, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Removal of sources?

@Tombah: why have you removed these sources, and a sentence which is entirely consistent with them. In your edit comment, are you claiming that Ian V. McGonigle and Nadia Abu El Haj are antisemitic? Onceinawhile (talk) 07:05, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

No, I have no idea how they came to their conclusions or whether they are up to date on genetic research. My claims are only directed at people who are aware of the mainstream viewpoint and nevertheless, when editing this article, choose to reject it in order to make a point. This attack on AJ origin is especially strange, given that their Middle Eastern and Southern European ancestry is mentioned in every single article published in recent years. I haven't yet accused anyone in this room of being antisemitic, but this piece is definitely starting to smell bad, and the ancestry of AJs is not the only reason. Tombah (talk) 07:15, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
These are highly reputable scholars and these are very recent publications. They agree with each other. There are no dissenting scholarly views. Onceinawhile (talk) 07:49, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
It is the recurrent issue with Tombah's editing, passing off as an established historical fact what is simply an ideological meme. The genetic perspective was touted as endorsing the theory for some decades. In the now flourishing discipline analysing the use of genetic science in ethnic discourse, we now know that this is all based on circular reasoning. One example from Burton's book lucidly outlines the flaw underwriting much of this research:

Geneticists “ require a clearly demarcable, empirically ,manageable endogamous population,” ie., groups that could be reliably identified as reproductively isolated” and therefore “evolutionarily coherent.” An effect of this requirement was that “non-biological knowledge entered the research design,” as “linguistics, ethnographers, historians, sociologists and others, as well as myths and claims of collective identity” provided geneticists with the necessary evidence to identify ideal communities for genetic resear5ch. The biological data collected from such research, in turn, cannot be interpreted without reference to non-biological knowledge and is therefore not a truly independent source of information about human history.

The production of ethnic categories through this process of epistemological layering and cycling through social and intellectual networks is therefore a fundamental component of all genetic research concerning human subjects. This process resembles a feedback loop, by which “folk concepts” of race and ethnicity feed into the assumptions and interpretations of scientific research, whose practitioners in turn feed their work back into the original popular discourse.Through this process, genetic researchers in the Middle East effectively transformed religious, linguistic, and other social identities into ethnicities; they contrasted allegedly endogamous communities, like Zoroastrians, Armenians, Jews, and Bedouin tribes with heavily admixed populations of Persians, Turks, and Arabs. Interactions between geneticists and their research subjects reified and reinforced communal identities through a hyperbolized sense of a group’s historical isolation from others, via socially or geographically enforced endogamy. Emphasizing this isolation became configured as positive and desirable for researchers and community members alike, since strict practices of endogamy were believed to preserve a community’s authenticity through and unbroken and undiluted genetic relationship to its ancestors.’Nishidani (talk) 08:11, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Non Neutral, Synthesis, Factually Inaccurate

The article attempts to insinuate through synthesis that mainstream genetic research is "Zionist". While going back and forth between "Zionist" and "Jewish" in a way that is unsettling. The entire concept of the article "Zionism, race and genetics", is not a real thing, and is an invention of this article purely through synth Drsmoo (talk) 13:24, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

No sources, just evidence free assertions. Selfstudier (talk) 13:28, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

The invented concept of this article is also disturbingly similar to "Jüdische Physik". Drsmoo (talk) 13:32, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Edit: Do any of the studies mentioned in this article describe themselves as "Zionist" or "Jewish race science"? If not, who calls these studies "Zionist" or "Jewish race science"? Drsmoo (talk) 13:39, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

? No idea what that means. Sources? Selfstudier (talk) 13:35, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

@Drsmoo: if your unsupported claim is true, how is that Springer, one of the world's most prestigious academic publishers, published a book called Zionism and the Biology of Jews? That book, and all the other high quality publications here, go "back and forth between "Zionist" and "Jewish"", because they are describing the connection between Zionism and Jewish race and genetic science – what other words would you have them use to cover this subject? Onceinawhile (talk) 13:39, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Is it your contention that that book is justification for an entire synth-filled article that insinuates that mainstream scholarly research is ideological? The subject is already covered in Genetic studies on Jews, which is actually a legitimate article, not a POV screed full of synth and false insinuations. Drsmoo (talk) 13:45, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Please feel free to suggest a merge if you think it can fit in there. This also covers race science, so it would require a history section explaining how one topic developed into the other from the point of view of nationalism.
As to your central claim that the article "insinuate through synthesis that mainstream genetic research is "Zionist"", it must not do that because it is not true. Clearly a very significant proportion is about medical research and other matters. But as to "mainstream genetic research about ancient Jewish origins", which is what this article should be covering, well the sources are all clear and consistent that that area of research has a significant connection to Zionist ideology. Onceinawhile (talk) 13:51, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
No, they are normal highly regarded genetic studies. Your WP: Synth insinuation that these studies are "Zionist" has no place on Misplaced Pages, no reliable source describes these specific studies as "Zionist" or "Jewish". That is your POV interpretation, and your personal views are not acceptable on Misplaced Pages. Drsmoo (talk) 14:03, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
At least as far as the text I have added goes, this article contains none of my views at all, only the views of respected scholars. For example:

Schaffer, Gavin (2010). "Dilemmas of Jewish Difference: Reflections on Contemporary Research into Jewish Origins and Types from an Anglo-Jewish Historical Perspective". Jewish Culture and History. 12 (1–2). Informa UK Limited: 86–88. doi:10.1080/1462169x.2010.10512145. ISSN 1462-169X. However, the historical record suggests that, on the subject of race, scientists do not deal in clear-cut truths but do 'spin' and do 'whitewash', albeit often subconsciously, presenting findings that are in line with personal beliefs and ideology, not set apart from social racial discourse in any clear sense. In Jewish difference debates, this is nowhere clearer than on the issue of Israel and Zionism. In his latest book on race, David Theo Goldberg has highlighted a link between racial research into ancient origins and contemporary land disputes: "Those whose racial origins' are considered geographically somehow to coincide with national territory (or its colonial extension) are deemed to belong to the nation; those whose geo-phenotypes obviously place them originally (from) elsewhere are all too often considered to pollute or potentially to terrorize the national space, with debilitating and even deadly effect." In this way, potential links between theories of an ancient Jewish past in Israel and contemporary conflict in the Middle East become important. In the face of a generally hostile international media, which often constructs Jews in Israel as colonisers and occupiers, scientific proofs of Jewish indigeneity in Israel confer legitimacy on Zionists and their sympathisers. This being the case, it is equally unsettling and significant, to the author at least, that the leading investigators of Jewish genetic roots frequently seem to be largely uncritical supporters of Israel. In Abraham's Children, Entine has noted that the pioneering scholar of the Priestly gene, Karl Skorecki, was 'motivated as much by his commitment to Israel as by scientific curiosity'. Similarly, David Goldstein states clearly and openly his attachment to Israel in Jacob's Legacy… the seekers of the priestly gene have an openly Zionist agenda...

Onceinawhile (talk) 14:08, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

I have read through the article again and strongly disagree with Drsmoo's assertion that the article "insinuate through synthesis that mainstream genetic research is "Zionist"". Drsmoo, please provide some specific examples so we can assess your claim. Onceinawhile (talk) 14:02, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

The section on "Jewish ethnic unity and connection to ancient Israelites" implies through unsourced synth that Harry Ostrer's study is "Zionist". Otherwise, it has no connection with a paragraph beginning with discussion of the supposed "supporters of Jewish nationalism have focused on the search for "Jewish genes"". The BLP insinuation is that Ostrer is a "supporter of Jewish nationalism" and that that has motivated his research. Which is a flagrant BLP violation. Drsmoo (talk) 14:08, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Hmm. I have read that section again in light of your concern, but I don't see it. There are only two sentences referring to Ostrer:
  • Geneticists such as Harry Ostrer and Nadia Abu El Haj have publicly disagreed on the interpretation of the evidence, as there are many genetic mutations restricted to certain groups of modern Jews, but no single gene uniting the majority of Jews worldwide.
  • Harry Ostrer disagreed with criticism of proposed genetic evidence for Jewish unity as "fragmentary and half-truths", and noted that the question "touches on the heart of Zionist claims for a Jewish homeland in Israel".
The first sentence says that he and another geneticist disagree. The second describes more of the disagreement, in his own words. Where exactly is the implication you are suggesting?
Onceinawhile (talk) 14:13, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
If, having written it, you don't see the problem with starting a sentence claiming that entire fields of research are ideological, and then linking to peer-reviewed studies from reputable journals, then there is no point in discussing further. Drsmoo (talk) 14:24, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Here is firm proof that you are wrong. From Ostrer's own book:

Ostrer, Legacy, page 33: “In 1911, the forces of social cohesion were religion, race science, and Zionism. Often, race science and Zionism went hand-in-hand, and the identification of a Jewish race provided justification for an ancestral homeland. This issue was addressed head-on in the Paris Peace Conference of 19I9, and the consensus on a Jewish race led to the mandate for the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. So the Jewish world of 1911 is the predecessor of the Jewish world of the twenty-first century. Many of the Diaspora communities are gone and, as Fishberg predicted, the center of Jewish life has moved to the United States and to Israel. 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."

Surely you agree it is clear now. Onceinawhile (talk) 14:29, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Nowhere does he describe his research as ideologically motivated. This article is a WP:ATTACK page and has no place on Misplaced Pages. Drsmoo (talk) 14:33, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Neither does this article. Your claims have no basis.
You might like to read the chapter: "Zionism’s New Jew and the Birth of the Genomic Jew" in Cynthia Baker's 2017 book Jew, published by Rutgers University Press. It, again, confirms everything in this article. How many sources saying the same thing would satisfy your concern? Particularly since you and other editors have proved zero sources which conflict with any of the substance of this article. Onceinawhile (talk) 15:07, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Still waiting for (any) details on what in the article is "factually inaccurate" rather than an assertion that this is so. Selfstudier (talk) 14:38, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Waiting for an AfD instead of unproductive tagging and pointless discourse. Selfstudier (talk) 14:49, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Article has been tagged synth and a section as well, which is it? Selfstudier (talk) 15:38, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
The article is synth on both a micro and macro level. There is synth occuring within single sentences, within paragraphs, and the article as a whole is a cherry-picked, POV-Fork conglomeration of synth. Drsmoo (talk) 15:40, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
Once again, please provide sourced evidence for these claims. Onceinawhile (talk) 15:43, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Broken reference

@Tombah: in this edit you added two references "<ref name=":1" />" but with no citation - please could you fix this? I am not sure what it is supposed to refer to. Onceinawhile (talk) 15:13, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Tag bombing?

This looks like a possible case of WP:TAGBOMBing, as no evidence has yet been provided for the various assertions made here on the talk page. If the editor(s) adding the tags continue to avoid the question when asked for sourced evidence to justify their claims, this will need to be addressed at a noticeboard. Onceinawhile (talk) 15:42, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

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