woensdag 19 november 2008

De Pro Israel Lobby 82


EI exclusive: a pro-Israel group's plan to rewrite history on Wikipedia Report, The Electronic Intifada.

A pro-Israel pressure group is orchestrating a secret, long-term campaign to infiltrate the popular online encyclopedia Wikipedia to rewrite Palestinian history, pass off crude propaganda as fact, and take over Wikipedia administrative structures to ensure these changes go either undetected or unchallenged.A series of emails by members and associates of the pro-Israel group CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America), provided to The Electronic Intifada (EI), indicate the group is engaged in what one activist termed a "war" on Wikipedia.A 13 March action alert signed by Gilead Ini, a "Senior Research Analyst" at CAMERA, calls for "volunteers who can work as 'editors' to ensure" that Israel-related articles on Wikipedia are "free of bias and error, and include necessary facts and context." However, subsequent communications indicate that the group not only wanted to keep the effort secret from the media, the public, and Wikipedia administrators, but that the material they intended to introduce included discredited claims that could smear Palestinians and Muslims and conceal Israel's true history.With over two million articles in English on every topic imaginable, Wikipedia has become a primary reference source for Internet users around the world and a model for collaboratively produced projects. Openness and good faith are among Wikipedia's core principles. Any person in the world can write or edit articles, but Wikipedia has strict guidelines and procedures for accountability intended to ensure quality control and prevent vandalism, plagiarism or distortion. It is because of these safeguards that articles on key elements of the Palestine-Israel conflict have generally remained well-referenced, useful and objective. The CAMERA plan detailed in the e-mails obtained by EI appears intended to circumvent these controls.In the past, CAMERA has gained notoriety for its tactic of accusing virtually anyone who does not toe a right-wing pro-Israel line of bias. The group has even accused editors and reporters of the Israeli daily Haaretz of being "extreme" and participating in "radical anti-Israel activity." Jeffrey Dvorkin, the former ombudsman of National Public Radio (NPR), frequently criticized by CAMERA for an alleged pro-Palestinian bias, wrote on the web publication Salon in February 2008 that "as a consequence of its campaign against NPR, CAMERA acted as the enabler for some seriously disturbed people," citing persistent telephone threats he received in the wake of CAMERA campaigns.Need for stealth and secrecy

Download CAMERA's emails [PDF - 2.7 MB]


Throughout the documents EI obtained, CAMERA operatives stress the need for stealth and secrecy. In his initial action alert, Ini requests that recipients "not forward it to members of the news media." In a 17 March follow-up email sent to volunteers, Ini explains that he wants to make the orchestrated effort appear to be the work of unaffiliated individuals. Thus he advises that "There is no need to advertise the fact that we have these group discussions."Anticipating possible objections to CAMERA's scheme, Ini conjectures that "Anti-Israel editors will seize on anything to try to discredit people who attempt to challenge their problematic assertions, and will be all too happy to pretend, and announce, that a 'Zionist' cabal (the same one that controls the banks and Hollywood?) is trying to hijack Wikipedia."But stealth and misrepresentation are presented as the keys to success. Ini suggests that after volunteers sign up as editors for Wikipedia they should "avoid editing Israel-related articles for a short period of time." This strategy is intended to "avoid the appearance of being one-topic editors," thus attracting unwanted attention.'

2 opmerkingen:

Sonja zei

Toevallig was ik er al mee bezig. Ik heb ook contact gehad met de hoofdaap daar, Mike Godwin, en ik kan iedereen bij deze verzekeren dat deze praktijken gewoon zullen doorgaan.

Anoniem zei

Wikipedia allways had been hijacked... Jammer genoeg.. Wikipedia is (en blijft) desalnietemin een fantastische tool om snel een basisinformatie te krijgen over een bepaald onderwerp, maar het is en blijft het werk van velen die op het internet bezig zijn. Iedereen die dat wil kan zich aanmelden op Wikipedia, en dan beginnen met alle informatie die er op staat te veranderen.
Het is ook daarom dat je bij heel wat informatie-items het bericht krijgt dat \'the content is disputed\'. Het open-encyclopedie-systeem van Wikipedia is tegelijkertijd z\'n sterkte maar ook z\'n zwakte...

Google heeft dan weer een andere zwakke plek: Het algoritme van Google telt het aantal keer dat een bepaalde zoekterm op het net verschijnt. Het is dus erg goed mogelijk om bij Google bvb. de Israëlische kant een boost te geven door een georchestreerd over-en-weer geblog over die Israëlische kant.
Met andere woorden; je kan met extra geblog over de Israëlische kant, de Palestijnse kant doen verdrinken in de overvloed van pro-Israël informatie.
Het is dus duidelijk: op het internet geldt alleen de wet van de sterkste.... Jammer genoeg....

Peter Flik en Chuck Berry-Promised Land

mijn unieke collega Peter Flik, die de vrijzinnig protestantse radio omroep de VPRO maakte is niet meer. ik koester duizenden herinneringen ...