Come on Harel, you are a true Wikipedian; you must have seen REAL yelling in your time before! :)
m.
On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 12:22 AM, Harel Cain harel.cain@gmail.com wrote:
You're free to go on, I was just feeling it was becoming less constructive and rather uncivilized, with all that yelling going on.
Harel
On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 12:21 AM, Maysara Omar maysara.omar@gmail.com wrote:
Harel and Moushira,
why the rush on closing this thread?!! :) Let us give time and space for
a
civilized and purposeful dialogue and deliberation to come to fruition
and
realization!
Maysara "All that is necessary to right action, is right judgment" _Rene
Descartes
On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 12:12 AM, Maysara Omar maysara.omar@gmail.com wrote:
Dear Yohai, I thought it was pretty clear that this has nothing to do with me personally. But just to emphasize, and not to yell or anything like
this:
THIS DISCUSSION HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ME PERSONALLY! Most appreciatively, -- Maysara "All that is necessary to right action, is right judgment." _Rene Descartes
2010/8/12 Yohai Edery yohaied@gmail.com
Hello Maysara and all,
I feel like I have to send an e-mail again regarding what you wrote
below
as there is a lot of miss information in what you wrote.
Firstly, let's put things on the table, as an Egyptian you are not feeling good with coming to Israel as it would seem to your friends
back
home like you are trying to "normalize" relations with Israel. Although there are almost 30 years of peace between our countries, Egypt and Egyptians have been always against normalizing relation with Israel and
in
fact there is a lot of incitement towards Israel and Jews in general in Egyptian media, books, cultural events and so. Israeli cultural
products
(movies, music, theater and such) were band from participation in
festival
in Egypt even international ones held in Egypt. The situation with
Jordan is
not better…unfortunately. On the meantime, Israel has welcomed movies,
music
and artists from Egypt and Jordan that have participated in festivals
and
events in Israel.
I can guarantee that people from all over the world will have no
problem
coming to the event in Israel. Israeli authorities will allow everyone
from
everywhere to come to Wikimania providing he/she has not been engaged
in
terrorist activities…which I believe is not the case for the
participants of
our event….I doubt Al Qaida, Hammas and Hezbollah care about Wikipedia.
I
can tell you from past experience that people from Libya and Lebanon
came to
conferences in Israel without any trouble. The problem maybe with their
own
home government….but that, unfortunately, we can't control.
Again, accusation bout maltreatment and confiscation of belongings are NONSENCE I want to remind you that Israel is a full functioning
democracy!!!
We DO NOT do things against the law and will not confiscate anything
from
anyone unless there is a solid reason. Again, I have been involved with
tens
of conferences in Israel and had many friends from all over the world
coming
to Israel, none of them suffered from any of those things you
maintained. I
would like to kindly ask you to stop with those accusations.
Regarding arriving to Israel from Cairo, again, you don’t have to do
that
by bus or car only like you said….you can easily fly to Ben gurion international airport in Tel Aviv on a non-stop flight from Cairo with
El-Al
Israeli airline or Air Sinai (part of Air Egypt). If you need help with making the reservations, I would love to help….
I think that change comes from people and not for the leaders….I would expect you to see this event as a great opportunity to start real
dialogue
between people in the Mideast and use such an important source of information like Wikipedia to a good use as a tool to bring people
together,
break stigmas and fight prejudice. The only way we can live together in peace is if we will get to know each other….I have visited Egypt and
Jordan
as well as the Palestinian territories…I know a lot about the Arab world…what do you know about me?
Hopping to show you all the real face of Israel when you are hear...
Good night from Haifa, Israel
Yohai Edery
יוחאי אדרי
E-mail: yohaied@gmail.com P Please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to
From: wikimania-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimania-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Maysara
Omar
Sent: Thursday, August 12, 2010 5:46 AM
To: Wikimania general list (open subscription) Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Problematic aspects of hosting the next conference in Haifa, Israel
Hello to All :)
- Of course i am aware that the decision has already been made. I
would
not have brought this issue had i not thought, (along with many others
by
the way who are unfortunately not here to express themselves about
this)
that whatever jury took that decision has fallen into a manifest error,
that
justifies a look back and reconsideration, rather than be ignored, and regardless of whether this will change things or not. The issue needs
to be
addressed, because it is very important. It is a fact, that
participants
from Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and possibly other countries,
will
never have the chance to attend the next wikimania conference should it
be
held in Israel. Further, other participants from other countries, particularly "Arab" countries whose citizens do not usually go to
Israel for
any purpose, and this applies to both Jordan and Egypt with whom Israel
is
in diplomatically fine terms, will find many troubles from both the
Israeli
and their own governments. This is no speculation, there are hundreds
of
accounts on the internet of maltreatment and confiscation of belongings
of
passengers for all sorts of reasons by Israeli officials at entry/exit points. Questions asked in such aggressive tonality and attitude
regarding
the passengers' views and opinion of Israel and the conflict in the
middle
east. Please ask the ministry of foreign affairs, whether they will let
some
attendees in, if they answered these questions as they do believe
rather
than fake a friendly answer!
- If even presidential elections can be repeated because their results
were doubtful, i cannot see why everyone here so far is talking about
the
"impossibility" of reconsidering the validity of the decision made by
the
jury, as though it is a sanctified or infallible one! Somehow it seems
that
so far no one apart from myself, who could get into Israel only
following a
car or bus ride of 8 hours from my very home in Cairo, took the time to think of the position of those who will never be permitted into Israel,
or
who will avoid doing so because Israel is in fact a problematic
destination
for them. And regardless of whether any of this is fair or not, we
currently
do have a realistic situation that is laden with injustice and great potential of practical disorder, which somehow was not raised during
the
decision making process, although it is no secret or news! This
suggests
that non of those who will be negatively effected by the decision, were present when the process of deciding was ongoing. One of the benefits
of
this discussion then, is perhaps to give more attention to such matters
as
representativeness, inclusive deliberation, and outreach, in further
such
processes of wikimania biding and decision making. Perhaps from now on,
we
should make more effort in reaching out for, you know, "all the people
on
Earth" who might want to come to wikimania with their experiences, etc. Unfortunately I was not there then, and maybe i won't be able to be
there
later, but I do not believe that it is too late to bring this issue
now, and
to attempt to correct what is wrong even by those who, understandably,
love
their own country and would have loved to see it hosting such a
wonderful
event. It is for a clean, freeing, progressive, and Humanistic
experience
and social process that we commit ourselves; the passing-by moments in
this
experience will be destructive if they are absorbed only in the
passing-by
moment!
Finally, Wikimania conferences must be accessible to everyone, without having to speak of making "exceptions" and taking extra measures to
smoothen
the passage of those who participate together everyday in creating and making the new free knowledge and culture of our age and the future.
This is
the position that I have chosen for myself, rather than the one that
you ask
me to adopt, that is, to suggest solutions to numberless problems and
to an
erroneous and unfair condition and situation. And now I ask you, what
is
YOUR position?
:)
--
Maysara
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-- Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur.
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