(Short intro: I am User:Amire80, editor in Hebrew, Russian and English
Wikipedias, and sysop in the English one.)
The whole article about Amnon Yitzhak, a well-known and controversial
Jewish preacher, was deleted from the Hebrew Wikipedia.
It happened after Wikimedia Israel received a letter from an attorney
representing Yitzhak, which requested to remove allegedly defamatory
material from the article.
The article was deleted and recreated without older versions. For the
short time that these versions were available, it was possible to see
that the article was not any more defamatory against Amnon Yitzhak
than an average newspaper or television item about him. The editors
who worked on it were not vandals and the material was reasonably
sourced. Now it's impossible to see that, too (unless one is a sysop
there).
Nevertheless, the bureaucrats of the Hebrew Wikipedia chose to salt
the article with an explanation similar to WP:OFFICE.
The problem is that it is doesn't seem to be a case for WP:OFFICE.
Wikimedia Israel is not the main Wikimedia Office, but only a small
local association, which is just beginning its life. In any case, as
far as my understanding of jurisdictions goes, Wikimedia Israel cannot
be held responsible for the content of the article and neither the
article's editors.
I am sincerely sorry to be a "schtinker". That's a Yiddish word for
"informer". The bureaucrats of the Hebrew Wikipedia are excellent
contributors, thanks to whom the Hebrew Wikipedia is one of the very
best projects of the WMF. But i am quite sure that they made a mistake
in this case. Wikipedia must not censor out sourced material after one
feeble legal threat so easily.
Many respected editors of the Hebrew Wikipedia voiced their opposition
to this deletion, but the sysops do not agree to restore the deleted
versions, saying that they won't do it without proper legal advice.
This is understandable; so - can someone from the Foundation Office,
who has experience with BLP legal situations help the Hebrew Wikipedia
sysops to solve this problem?
Thanks in advance.
--
Amir Elisha Aharoni
English -
http://aharoni.wordpress.com
Hebrew -
http://haharoni.wordpress.com
"We're living in pieces,
I want to live in peace." - T. Moore