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Arbitration Committee proceedings

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Case name	Closed
Yasuke	13 Nov 2024

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Motion name	Date posted
Motions: PIA Canvassing	4 January 2024

Motions

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Motions: PIA Canvassing

Do not remove a motion or any statements or comments unless you are a clerk or an Arbitrator. There must be no threaded discussion, so please comment only in your own section.

General facts

1) Since at least October 2023, there has been an ongoing effort by one or more banned editors to canvass discussions within the Israel-Palestine topic area and asking for proxy edits to promote a pro-Israel point of view. Based on the evidence received by the Committee, the following discussions have been targeted:

The Arbitration Committee would like to thank the editors who reported canvassing. If editors have any additional canvassing evidence, please bring it to the Committee's attention. The Arbitration Committee asks the Wikimedia Foundation for assistance creating technical measures to prevent the ongoing abuse.

Support:

While I am waiting to hear from the specific editors named below and from the community at large about this issue, I am absolutely ready to vote on this motion as I find the evidence of what it says incontrovertibly true and think the request of the Wikimedia Foundation to be a good one. Barkeep49 (talk) 23:29, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:36, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This is well-supported by the evidence that the Arbitration Committee has received. - Aoidh (talk) 00:51, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
We do indeed have this evidence. GeneralNotability (talk) 01:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The evidence for this is unambiguous. Even if no one actually acted on the canvassing, it was desperately attempted. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 04:43, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
--Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 06:24, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This is plainly well-supported by the evidence the Committee received. firefly ( t · c ) 08:08, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
While additional comments and evidence are welcome, these are indeed the facts as we have them. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:06, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Z1720 (talk) 20:53, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Primefac (talk) 21:07, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose:

Abstain:

Arbitrator views and discussions (General facts)

Community input on these motions is highly encouraged for those with relevant evidence, whether about the below-listed users or about other users whom we might have missed. Private evidence (including emails) can be sent to the Committee at arbcom-enwikimedia.org. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 21:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Clerk notes (General facts)

Noting that I have moved Agmonsnir's comments to their own section. For these motions the "no threaded discussion" rule is in effect - please only comment in your own section. firefly ( t · c ) 08:23, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Novem Linguae (General facts)

The Arbitration Committee asks the Wikimedia Foundation for assistance creating technical measures to prevent the ongoing abuse. This may be too general to be actionable. If you have any specific ideas in mind, I think mentioning them to the WMF would be a good idea. –Novem Linguae (talk) 00:00, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I imagine we'll have specific details in asks for the WMF. We brainstormed for a few minutes today on our monthly call with T&S, but will probably want to connect with the tech folks before making a specific ask. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 00:17, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Galobtter (General facts)

Does ArbCom know the identities of any of the banned editor(s) involved here? Galobtter (talk) 00:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes @Galobtter. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 04:52, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Then I'm wondering why we are not told who's responsible? (This might help the community figure out what other edits are involved and what else needs to be done to address the problem?) Galobtter (talk) 05:02, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How would it help the community @Galobtter? I think i"m in a minority on the committee on this issue, but I genuinely don't understand how that piece of information helps non-CU editors identify this disruption more than the information we've already provided. Barkeep49 (talk) 16:17, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, looking at one of the discussions mentioned, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Genocide against Palestinians, L235 mentions that Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/AndresHerutJaim is involved. I think it'd be useful to know that any discussions that future socks of that editor participate in should be scrutinized for canvassing? I'm not necessarily in favor of transparency for the sake of it but I can see genuine utility here. Galobtter (talk) 18:15, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I guess that editor didn't actually edit that AfD? I mean it's possible that the editors involved are really good about keeping any onwiki activity separated from their offwiki canvassing activity, in which case maybe it is not so useful, but that isn't entirely clear to me. Galobtter (talk) 18:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Callitropsis (General facts)

It seems to me that GeneralNotability's blocks of Atbannett and Hmbr may be related to this. Both editors supported the unblock of an editor that had been indeffed for violating an ARBPIA topic ban with similar rationales. After the discussion was closed with consensus against the unblock, Tamzin disclosed that they had sent evidence to ArbCom that Atbannett and Hmbr were canvassed to the discussion by a banned editor. Around a month later, Atbannett and Hmbr were both blocked by GeneralNotability, although the block of Atbannett was temporary, unlike the block of Hmbr. Both editors have since filed unsuccessful unblock requests. From what I can tell (correct me if I'm wrong), the blocks themselves are not clearly designated as CU or ArbCom actions, although such can certainly be inferred from the context. They were not accompanied by any announcement, and both were notified on their talk pages using {{SockBlock}}, which is for abuse of multiple accounts (despite the notes in the block log that they were blocked for meatpuppetry) and stipulates that the blocks are indefinite (despite Atbannett's block being set to expire after 30 days).

It's unclear to me whether the block of Atbannett was meant to be indefinite. This event certainly seems to be related to the events described in this motion and I'm not sure whether the omission from this motion is intentional. Apologies if I'm just kicking up a hornet's nest that could've been left alone and forgotten about, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to at least mention this incident for the sake of posterity and ask for clarification. — Callitropsis🌲[formerly SamX · talk · contribs] 01:25, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Those blocks were not related to the canvassing in this topic area. GeneralNotability (talk) 14:29, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Tamzin (General facts)

Should Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive356 § User:Gilabrand unblock request be included in the list? (Referring specifically to Atbannett, Hmbr, and probably Homerethegreat's !votes; I have no reason to think any other overturn !votes were in bad faith.) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|she) 03:24, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It was not part of the evidence I have seen -- Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 22:24, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Vice_regent (General facts)

This RfC reminded me of what I said here at WP:ARBIRP. Within a few hours Marokwitz proposing an RfC, Homerethegreat, Zanahary, Oleg_Yunakov, Dovidroth and Agmonsnir all quickly voted, none bothering to address any of the sourcing or neutrality issues I had raised (I'm not saying they should have agreed with me, but they simply ignored my comment). In the case of WP:ARBIRP, it was later determined[1], that someone would send emails to users with links to RfCs and talking points and they'd vote accordingly. I'm not saying that all the above voters were canvassed, but I have a strong suspicion that at least some of them were. The behavior of Agmonsnir was suspicious (their very first edit[2] to Hamas was to jump in the middle of an edit war and revert to Homerethegreat’s version using the same false talking point others were using; then their very first edit to Talk:Hamas was their RfC vote) so I asked them about it, but they said they hadn't received any off-wiki communication[3].VR _talk 04:12, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by IOHANNVSVERVS (General facts)

Since another editor has already mentioned them, I'll add that I have suspicions regarding Agmonsir's involvment in this as well. Examples:

Dovidroth added content to Israeli cuisine but then selfreverted citing ARBPIA concerns. Minutes later Agmonsnir restored the added content. Agmonsnir had never edited that page before [4]

Homerethegreat added a POV tag to an article with no explanation [5] which was then removed by another editor with edit summary "Only disputed by you." Agmonsnir then restored the tag saying "Sorry, my friend, disputed by me too." [6] When asked to explain their restoration of the POV tag (they had to be asked to do so at the talk page), their response was: "It is obvious. An article on an ongoing event that has conflicting narratives about it has serious concern on neutrality by default." [7]

Homerethegreat removed significant content from the lead of an article. [8] I restored it and started a discussion on the talk page. Agmonsnir then reverted my restoration without discussion. [9]

Another instance of potential tag teaming with Homerethegreat here [10], where significant content was removed with edit summary "I think it’s best to discuss changes in Talk first. Homerethegreat’s version was stable for quite some time and therefore we should start from there." Content removed included: "Before the war, Israel secretly furthered the growth of Hamas, seeing it as a mechanism of preventing an independent Palestine.^[1]" IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 06:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 04:44, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding nableezy's mention of AndresHerutJaim, who seems to have been a pro-Israel sockmaster who was banned in 2012, I'll add the following:

It seems like the whitewashing edit war on Genocides in history (1946 to 1999) involving Homerethegreat and Dovidroth, which I brought up here [11], was begun (here [12]) by Joemb1977, a now blocked user with a notice on their userpage reading "An editor has expressed a concern that this account may be a sockpuppet of AndresHerutJaim"

IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 16:44, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ Mazzetti, Mark; Bergman, Ronen (2023-12-10). "'Buying Quiet': Inside the Israeli Plan That Propped Up Hamas". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-12-14.

Statement by Aquillion (General facts)

Going over the listed discussions, here's the other editors that leap out as having activated or reactivated their accounts and who contributed to several of these discussions, often with no interaction with the articles prior to the day canvassed users started appearing:

User:דוב / dov. Account gamed the 500/30 restrictions; later had extendedconfirmed permissions revoked and disappeared. Contributions to discussions on the list include [13][14][15][16].
User:טבעת-זרם / TaBaZzz. [17][18][19][20][21][22]

Obviously some caution is necessary because there are logical reasons why someone with an interest in the topic would reappear on October 7th, but these editors are notable for appearing a week later and contributing to a bunch of discussions that were canvassed here, several of which ought to have been hard for a newly-returned user to find. --Aquillion (talk) 06:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Marokwitz (general facts)

1. Is there conclusive evidence for proxy behaviour? I motion to reconsider the strength of the evidence presented in this case and the potential that it was the result of a malicious actor. While I'm not aware of the details, the truth of the accusations is unclear, committee member User:Moneytrees comment above, "Even if no one actually acted on the canvassing, it was desperately attempted," raises red flags for me, suggesting that there is no conclusive evidence of the accused editors acting as proxies, but rather an attempt to canvass them may have occurred, which is not their own wrongdoing. I think the question is very much about whether they acted upon the canvassing, or not.

2. Question to arbitration committee members: I would like to inquire the committee members: Are you convinced beyond reasonable doubt that you were not misled by someone maliciously trying to get other users blocked?

3. Observation on circumstantial evidence: Regarding evidence that was posted here about editors suspposedly "appearing" in discussions, to me, it appears it is totally circumstantial. Myself and other editors, as I am sure all of you, have their ways to track discussions in their areas of interest, for example, by adding talk pages or relevant WikiProjects to their watch list. It is not at all "surprising" that people appear in discussions, if if this was considered "evidence" then most of the editors in Wikipedia should be blocked.

4. Motion for transparency about involvement of Nableezy I motion for transparency regarding the involvement of topic-banned user Nableezy in this case. How did topic-banned user Nableezy obtain the private evidence? It is highly suspicious that this user, a known opponent of the accused editors who was topic banned for battleground mentality, claims to have seen the private evidence, and engaged in personal correspondence with the committee members. If such evidence exists, I propose it be made public for equitable scrutiny and discussion, and that all private correspondence of Nableezy with committee members be made public.

5. Personal note and recommendation Finally, in a personal note, I could only guess that private emails on this platform were part of the story here, so I feel lucky that I disabled emails on Wikipedia, years ago, suspecting something like this can happen - the private messaging option being used as a weapon for clever wiki-militants incriminating opponents. I recommend that all editors consider disabling receiving email in settings, now, to prevent its misuse as a tool for unjustly blocking you. Marokwitz (talk) 08:07, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Marokwitz, there is evidence showing proxy edits made and that canvassing occurred. When I said that, the key word is "actually", as in "even if there is some odd explanation for the proxy edits, the canvassing occurred", although I realize that may have been lost on some. Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 21:29, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm quite sympathetic to "just because someone received an email and participated doesn't mean they were canvassed". In fact there are other editors who received and an email and who participated but who aren't named here. As for @Nableezy, their involvement with private evidence happened before any topic ban. We are discussing their further involvement in this discussion. Barkeep49 (talk) 22:46, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Moved from a reply to Novem Linguae If I may, a technical recommendation would be that every email sent through the platform is automatically accompanied by a message on the receiver's talk page (without the email content), with no ability to disable this, thereby creating an additional level of transparency and deterrence against misuse of the email facility. Marokwitz (talk) 20:33, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Moved from a reply to EytanMelech I recommend that you copy this to your statement concerning your block, below, as it is irrefutable evidence that you were fully transparent and complained about the canvassing in real-time. Marokwitz (talk) 21:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Agmonsnir (General facts)

In reply to Vice regent I find it hard to understand the "suspicions" related to me. I am used to believe in good faith on Wikipedia, and now these "suspicions" look very suspicious to me. Anyway, my editing on Wiki is always legitimate. Agmonsnir (talk) 05:36, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

And just to make it clear, I do not know any of the editors mentioned here and were not emailed by them etc.... I am recently watching some pages and new areas of interest, and what I understand from this discussion is that in some of them there are edit wars that are related to toxic history between some editors. I am not a part of it. Agmonsnir (talk) 05:49, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In reply to IOHANNVSVERVS I find it hard to understand the "suspicions" related to me. I am used to believe in good faith on Wikipedia, and now these "suspicions" look very suspicious to me. Anyway, my editing on Wiki is always legitimate. Agmonsnir (talk) 05:36, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

And just to make it clear, I do not know any of the editors mentioned here and were not emailed by them etc.... I am recently watching some pages and new areas of interest, and what I understand from this discussion is that in some of them there are edit wars that are related to toxic history between some editors. I am not a part of it. Agmonsnir (talk) 05:49, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Nableezy (General facts)

I think this is missing some of the more obvious examples of canvassing where only a tangential relationship to the subjects these editors normally edit saw a targeted effort to vote stack, such as at Talk:Apartheid#Requested move 12 October 2023. Following an email request to vote no, the move request (which included Fagerbakke, later blocked as a sock of AndresHerutJaim and HaNagid at the time as LUC995 and later blocked as a sock of Tombah), had several users make their first ever edit to that talk page, those being EytanMelech, Mistamystery, Pg 6475, Dovidroth, and Zanahary. None of those users have edited either the talk page or article since (Zanahary, Pg6475, Mistamystery, EytanMelech and Dovidroth edits to the talk page), and none of them were, from the contributions, participating in requested moves that were not targetted for canvassing. I also think you all should consider some sort of amnesty for people who admit their involvement, perhaps a topic ban instead of an indefinite block. nableezy - 14:47, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

People can keep trying to make this about me, and if there is any response needed to the various things being said about me here then please let me know. I dont intend to engage in any back and forth, but if some clarification is needed by the committee then by all means tell me and Ill be happy to provide it. I also have no issue with any of the evidence that can be made public to be made public. nableezy - 15:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by EytanMelech (General facts)

Let it be known for the record that I almost certainly did not have a "tangential relationship to the subjects" prior to the October 12 request on the Apartheid article on Wikipedia. 2 days prior, I made 6 edits to the Kfar Aza massacre page (with previously unused sourcing and over a thousand bytes of data), as well as an edit and comment on Two-State solution. Two days prior to that, I made over 2k bytes of edits to the Alexandria shooting page. My interest in these articles did not spawn from any sort of canvassing beggars from people like your stated Faggerbakke, but because of the October 7th attack, the deadliest single massacre of Jews in decades, which spawned a desire in me to improve and support coverage on.

In fact, I CONTACTED ANOTHER USER MONTHS AGO, COMPLAINING ABOUT HIS ATTEMPTS TO TRY TO RECRUIT ME. I admitted I did agree with some of his ideas, but I did not believe it was right for him to try to make me make edits on his behalf. EytanMelech (talk) 15:02, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Coretheapple (general facts)

I weighed in on the DavidRoth topic ban appeal, only to see that it has been closed with a link to this page. Unless I'm missing something, it appears that User: Nableezy, who is currently topic-banned for engaging in battlefield conduct in opposition to DovidRoth and other editors, has (notwithstanding that topic ban) supplied private evidence indicating that DovidRoth and other editors he doesn't like have been canvassed and edited on the basis of that canvassing. In response to that evidence, which is described here as convincing beyond a shadow of a doubt, editors are going to be kicked off the project. Checkmate.

Really, Arbcom? You're going to indefinitely ban editors under these circumstances? I think Arbcom owes the community full transparecy. No possible privacy concerns justify such a "star chamber" action. Yes I know I know. Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, Wikipedia is not a place for due process, yadda yadda. You don't have to tell me but why rub it in people's faces, especially in such a hot-button area such as this? The full evidence upon which you are relying should be made known (with redactions as necessary) not just for the sake of the community, but for the sake of readers of Wikipedia who might want to know how Wikipedia functions and why I/P articles may or may not have a certain slant or POV. Don't just say "oh we have private evidence from a very involved party and we are acting on it. Seeya!" If you do, I think it would be a serious mistake. I used to edit to stop paid editing and COI, but I stopped some years ago because I saw that it was futile and because I was working to improve the reputation of the project and the Foundation, when both seemed largely indifferent. I am starting to get a feeling of "déjà vu." Coretheapple (talk) 15:04, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I notice that the targets of this case want the evidence disclosed and that Nableezy does too. That makes it unanimous. I also think that in fairness, Arbcom should allow other topic-banend editors to comment here. It would seem bizarre indeed if only one topic-banned editor is allowed to comment here, while the rest are not. Coretheapple (talk) 15:25, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Arbcom has a policy mandate, To resolve matters unsuitable for public discussion for privacy, legal, or similar reasons;. Were ArbCom not to protect the encyclopedia from concerted efforts at disruption we would not be doing the work that the community has trusted us to do because if we're not doing it, no one is even attempting to stop these concerted efforts. If you don't want us to do that work, there is the community route for amending the policy.

As to the specifics, Nableezy has mentioned that their evidence is only about 1 of the 3 editors named here (From the motion being discussed here (emphasis added) The Arbitration Committee would like to thank the editors who reported canvassing.). So Nableezy isn't able to just give permission for the evidence to be disclosed. Further, even for the evidence Nableezy reported, not all of the personal information is Nableezy's, or one of the named parties here. Wikipedia policies and guidelines don't allow Arbcom to forfeit other users' private information out of your desire to see everything. Barkeep49 (talk) 21:28, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I understand the privacy issues here, but given the high visibility of this subject area I would suggest that more is at stake than the personal curiosity of one editor. Couldn't you disclose redacted evidence? Coretheapple (talk) 22:53, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I won't disagree that you understand the privacy issues and don't give it as much weight, instead giving weight to the high visibility of the topic area. Whereas I am obligated under policy to give more weight to the privacy and confidentiality considerations. As for disclosing redacted evidence if this were one or two emails we were talking about it might be practical. We have named 15 different discussions which have been targeted and it's not like those 15 discussions were targeted in a couple of emails. Producing redacted evidence would require hours of work from likely multiple arbitrators and I'm definitely not willing to volunteer to do that, preferring to spend my time thinking about the evidence, thinking about the feedback and comments, and truthfully replying to the comments and feedback. In fact I feel some obligation to respond because I am one of the people who really advocated for us to do this in public, rather than completely in private as policy would support and past practice would tell us to do. Barkeep49 (talk) 23:15, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Do those same privacy considerations prevent you from showing the evidence to the affected parties? Coretheapple (talk) 23:52, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe I'm missing something because it seems like we obviously couldn't show the parties the emails we've received. Barkeep49 (talk) 00:54, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Zanahary (General facts)

Really displeased to have been brought into this. I think users whom no one is actually standing up and accusing of anything should be left alone. Nableezy and Vice_regent, please either accuse me of proxy voting or refrain from tagging me. Zanahary (talk) 17:55, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Oleg Yunakov (General facts)

(In response to Vice_regent) I always write only my own opinion. I hope this is the first and the last time I'll see such false acquisitions from you. With regards, Oleg Y. (talk) 00:32, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Oleg Yunakov: I've moved this to your own section; only arbitrators and clerks may comment in others' sections.
Please address your comments primarily to the Arbitration Committee rather than to other users. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 00:45, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good. Thanks! With regards, Oleg Y. (talk) 01:02, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Objective3000 (General facts)

I understand why all folks want to see all evidence. But there is a reason that there are only something like 50 or so CUs and far fewer arbs. These are members who have gained the trust of the community and must deal with privacy issues. Further, CU techniques, although hardly secret in the tech field, should not be broadcast. I am also uncomfortable with claims that we, the hoi polloi, must know exactly what info and by whom was provided as that brings up scary incidents IRL. WP in not a democracy. Barring an insurrection, I think we need to trust presented info as far as it goes. Of course possible contrary evidence can be presented. (Albeit as an editor in PIA I have seen nothing in the general facts that is surprising.) Side comment: A horizontal rule would be useful between the four major sections. O3000, Ret. (talk) 01:39, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Legoktm (General facts)

I'm not really a fan of the direct request to the WMF as part of this. Why are volunteer developers unable to help with this? The vast majority of anti-abuse tooling was, and still is, designed, developed, and/or maintained by volunteers. I can't imagine this anti-canvassing whatever is something that just the WMF can accomplish, and if that's the case, it seems like a much larger problem. Legoktm (talk) 02:07, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by BilledMammal (General facts)

I am grateful that the committee has chosen to do this publicly and applaud this move towards increased transparency.

However, I am concerned that this is quickly turning into a witch-hunt, with editors tossing out accusations with little to no evidence, accusations that in a different forum would result in a boomerang as often as not.

I think it would be beneficial for the committee to instruct editors to avoid issuing accusations unless they have some form of evidence for them, and to remind editors that posting unsupported accusations - casting aspersions - can result in sanctions. 02:59, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Statement by {other-editor} (General facts)

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should adopt the motion or provide additional information.

Dovidroth

2) Based on information from the checkuser tool and on information received, the Committee determines that Dovidroth (talk · contribs) most likely participated in discussions due to canvassing and made proxy edits for a banned editor. As a result, they are indefinitely banned from Wikipedia. This ban may be appealed immediately after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter.

Support:

Oppose:

Abstain:

Arbitrator views and discussions (Dovidroth)

Statement by Dovidroth (Dovidroth)

I am writing to express my shock and concern regarding these accusations. I acknowledge that I have received multiple canvassing emails through the Wikipedia private emails system, which I ignored, and I have not acted upon them or responded in any manner.

Furthermore, in the interest of transparency and fairness, I am formally requesting that the Arbitration Committee provide me with the private evidence that has been compiled against me. This request is made in the spirit of understanding the full context of the allegations and to allow me to defend myself.

In addition to this message, I will also be reaching out to the Arbitration Committee via email to reiterate my request. The unfolding of events gives me reason to believe that this situation might be part of an orchestrated campaign to smear pro-Israel editors, a concern that deeply troubles me.

It is my hope that the Committee will consider my request with the seriousness it deserves, ensuring a fair and just process for all parties involved.

Regarding the issues raised by @Philipnelson99, @Tamzin had previously stated that my ban was only involving sock puppets, which this case was not. Furthermore, although a banned user got involved in the middle, I was simply restoring the earlier version of @Homerethegreat, who is not a banned user. For these reasons, I do not think that this was a "pretty clear violation" as Philipnelson99 suggests. Nevertheless, as soon as Tamzin told me that it was potentially an issue, I self-reverted. Dovidroth (talk) 09:49, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I implore the Committee not to close the arbitration case until I have received this evidence that I requested privately and have been given a fair opportunity to defend myself. Dovidroth (talk) 13:32, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Philipnelson99 (Dovidroth)

While this doesn't speak directly to whether or not Dovidroth has engaged in canvassing, BUT I do believe it's pertinent to note that Dovidroth was sanctioned by Tamzin as part of an unblock agreement. This sanction was As a revert restriction, you may not restore any edit within the Arab–Israeli conflict topic area that was made in violation of a ban or block and reverted for that reason. I and nableezy were both concerned that Dovidroth had violated this agreement. In the situation I was concerned about it was a pretty clear violation of the sanction but Dovidroth self-reverted after Tamzin explained that the revert Dovidroth had made was a possible violation. Philipnelson99 (talk) 22:40, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by starship.paint (Dovidroth)

In the interests of transparency and fairness, could Dovidroth publish the content of all of the recieved canvassing emails, after redacting email addresses and any other personal/private information? starship .paint (RUN) 10:06, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This is not a simple request. See, without opining on the correctness of the advice there, WP:POSTEMAIL.
Separately, I would ask that you direct your statements to the arbitrators rather than to other users (e.g., suggest that we ask Dovidroth to send us, or the community, a full copy of the emails). Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 10:09, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@L235: - thank you for informing me. I struck the above and would suggest that ArbCom ask Dovidroth to send ArbCom a full copy of the emails. starship .paint (RUN) 11:31, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by {other-editor} (Dovidroth)

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should adopt the motion or provide additional information.

EytanMelech

3) Based on information from the checkuser tool and on information received, the Committee determines that EytanMelech (talk · contribs) most likely made proxy edits for a banned editor. As a result, he is indefinitely banned from Wikipedia. This ban may be appealed immediately after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter.

Support:

Oppose:

Abstain:

Arbitrator views and discussions (EytanMelech)

I will wait to see if other evidence is submitted, but based on the evidence we've received and Eytan's statement below I currently plan to oppose this motion. Barkeep49 (talk) 23:30, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
~~I agree that at the moment, the evidence provided for this specific motion is insufficient.~~ ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:37, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Nableezy: To me personally, this is not a technically accurate summary of the quality of the evidence provided by you. I'll explain my concern in an e-mail to you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:12, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, my concern has been resolved – I'll have a look again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@EytanMelech: Have you at any point received any emails asking you to make any sort of edit (specific or general) on Wikipedia? If you are not comfortable answering this question publicly here please feel free to email the Arbitration Committee privately. - Aoidh (talk) 01:35, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by EytanMelech (EytanMelech)

Hello everyone!

I was unaware there was an arbitration request out me and was quite shocked to find out that there is a belief that I am taking part in canvassing or have been making proxy edits on behalf of banned users.

Let me start by saying that I was approached by user @Nableezy: via my talk page ^{[permanent section links: 1, 2]} on November 7th and December 12th of last year asking me if I had taken part in any sort of this type of behavior (being recruited to make edits/votes). I missed the first message, but quickly replied to the second one stating that I had not been given any edits or votes to put in by any user, blocked or unblocked.

As one can tell by my edit history, especially within the last few months, I have done a decent amount of work on articles surrounding Israel and Judaism, although mostly surrounding the Old Yishuv and old Jewish culture. I will not deny the fact that I have a pro-Israel stance, although I try not to let that get in the way of my impartiality, such as I did when I created the English Wikipedia article for the Killing of Yuval Castleman, a good samaritan who was shot and killed by an IDF soldier due to the shooter, Freija, suspecting him of being a terrorist.

I have also participated in many talk discussions and AfDs regarding the Israel-Palestine conflict. I have voted in certain ways, but I can guarantee you that those are in respect to my genuine opinions on the subject and are not dictated by anyone else and I have never voted a certain way because I was told to by another user. I often browse articles surrounding the conflict and habitually check talk pages of articles, and if I see something to vote on there, I may if I believe I either have something to add or wish for my voice to be heard.

I am sorry that you believe me to be doing work on behalf of another user or users, but I simply am not. I value Wikipedia very much, as I have demonstrated in my nearly 6,000 edits on the site, and my 150+ articles created in the past few years. I will not lie when I say I am terrified of a ban with my work being locked away forever, but I have simply not done what has been accused of me, although I do suspect Nableezy had a word in this.

( This is an addition to my statement from the general discussion as reccomended by Makrowitz, as it is good evidence proving that I did not make proxy edits and that I complained about canvassing in real time.:

Let it be known for the record that I almost certainly did not have a "tangential relationship to the subjects" prior to the October 12 request on the Apartheid article on Wikipedia. 2 days prior, I made 6 edits to the Kfar Aza massacre page (with previously unused sourcing and over a thousand bytes of data), as well as an edit and comment on Two-State solution. Two days prior to that, I made over 2k bytes of edits to the Alexandria shooting page. My interest in these articles did not spawn from any sort of canvassing beggars from people like your stated Faggerbakke, but because of the October 7th attack, the deadliest single massacre of Jews in decades, which spawned a desire in me to improve and support coverage on.

In fact, I CONTACTED ANOTHER USER MONTHS AGO, COMPLAINING ABOUT HIS ATTEMPTS TO TRY TO RECRUIT ME. I admitted I did agree with some of his ideas, but I did not believe it was right for him to try to make me make edits on his behalf. EytanMelech (talk) 15:02, 5 January 2024 (UTC))[reply]

Cheers

EytanMelech (talk) 22:24, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Edit: I forgot to mention this when I submitted my statement, but let it be known that I am more than glad to answer any questions regarding this investigation.

Additionally, I would like to add comments regarding my issue with Nableezy in particular. As soon as I found out that I was being voted on for something Israel-Palestine related, I assume it had to have been him. He has previously asked me multiple times about this issue, and he also has been in edit disputes with me a few times on Israel-related articles. This is unsurprising, as he was recently sanctioned against editing in Israel-Palestine articles for battleground editing, and I suspect he is hosting a similar ideology here. I am aware that he has sent the Arbitration Committee information via email, although I cannot properly respond to the claims because I have gone through my edit history multiple months back and have struggled to find anything that aligns with the information that is being provided publicly to me. I suspect it will be near impossible to defend myself when I am not even being told what I did that counts as editing on behalf of another user. I also think it is quite odd that he is advocating against others for banning on Wikipedia when he himself has been penalized for problematic edit warring on behalf of his opinions himself.

(permanent section links added) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:42, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

[in response to Nableezy below] First of all, please remove my comment if I am not supposed to reply, I am not sure if I am allowed to directly address Nableezy in this thread, my accuser. This is my first time involved in one of these arbitration discussions.

I would like to say that I have looked back at my edits on contentious topics regarding Israel-Palestine conflict, and I have not seen a very good example of me having done anything of the sort that you address right here in your statement. I have definitely re-done an edit that someone did in examples of reverts, but it doesn't even look like I used similar edit summaries to recent edits of that period, and I have looked back to edits right before the start of the current war for this. If you are comfortable providing an example to me personally, I can address certain claims. EytanMelech (talk) 00:22, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

[in response to Aoidh above] Yes I have recieved emails before from people. The majority of my emails have simply been people asking for general Wikipedia help (i.e. questions and whatnot about sourcing, asking my opinion on certain edits & help with references), but I have also received emails from people who have directly asked me to make certain edits regarding the Israel Palestine conflict.

There are many emails, such as ones of this nature, that I have ignored, or have replied to in an avoidant manner (i.e. make an excuse for not fulfilling the request while still trying to be nice to be nice). Examples include requests for me to do reverts of edits or to change existing information in articles based on conflicting sources. EytanMelech (talk) 01:58, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Nableezy (EytanMelech)

The evidence that I have seen, and sent to the committee, shows, in my view conclusively, that a banned editor made requests for specific edits that included edit-summaries to be used, and that this editor carried out the requested edits and copy-pasted the provided edit summaries. If that is not considered proxying for a banned user then I would appreciate some clarification as to what the committee does consider to be "proxying". nableezy - 00:05, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

ToBeFree I responded to your email, and I think it addresses your concerns. You can ask others who have publicly stated they were contacted by editors who were later blocked as socks, such as Pincrete (diff) to send you the original emails if they might be amenable to doing so. nableezy - 01:04, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Pincrete (EytanMelech)

In reply to Nableezy I cannot add much to the info in the diff nableezy offered above (copied here) beyond confirming that I was canvassed to vote (implicitly in favour of keeping "Glorification of martyrdom in Palestinian society"). I would have been amenable to forwarding the email sent to me from the now banned user, but I now appear to have deleted it. The email address of the sender was very generic and international and unlikely to add any useful info. Pincrete (talk) 07:22, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Coretheapple (EytanMelech)

I've already expressed my general concerns, and I have specific concerns raised by the statements by this editor and DavidRoth above. Posting it here but it applies to DavidRoth as well.

If I understand it, correctly, both were not canvassing but were the targets of canvassing, allegedly complying with the requests of an unnamed banned editor. This raises a few bothersome scenarios that may or may not be relevant here, but certainly may be in the future. I can share them with arbcom privately by email in more detail, but suffice to say that, as a general principle, banning people on the basis of being targets of canvassers raises a number of troubling issues. Please let me know if you want me to email you with my concerns. Coretheapple (talk) 19:57, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by {other-editor} (EytanMelech)

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should adopt the motion or provide additional information.

Homerethegreat

4) Based on information from the checkuser tool and on information received, the Committee determines that Homerethegreat (talk · contribs) most likely participated in discussions due to canvassing and made proxy edits for a banned editor. As a result, they are indefinitely banned from Wikipedia. This ban may be appealed immediately after the enactment of this remedy, and every twelve months thereafter.

Support:

Oppose:

Abstain:

Arbitrator views and discussions (Homerethegreat)

Statement by Homerethegreat (Homerethegreat)

Statement by Tamzin

I will just note that Homerethegreat !voted to unblock Gilabrand in between the !votes by Atbannett and Hmbr, which as noted above were canvassed and led to both of those users being CUblocked. I was unable to find a smoking gun that Homerethegreat was themself canvassed, but all three users' votes began with the same "Strongly support the lifting of block", all made similar rationales describing Gila's editing in flattering terms, and all were infrequent AN posters. Homer, for instance, had only posted there once before. On its own that isn't dispositive, but may compound whatever private evidence ArbCom has. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|she) 02:23, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by IOHANNVSVERVS

I believe these discussions are relevant regarding Homerethegreat:

IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 00:59, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by {other-editor} (Homerethegreat)

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should adopt the motion or provide additional information.

[1] Mazzetti, Mark; Bergman, Ronen (2023-12-10). "'Buying Quiet': Inside the Israeli Plan That Propped Up Hamas". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-12-14.

[1]

@@ Line 164: / Line 164: @@
 ==== Statement by Legoktm (General facts) ====
 I'm not really a fan of the direct request to the WMF as part of this. Why are volunteer developers unable to help with this? The vast majority of anti-abuse tooling was, and still is, designed, developed, and/or maintained by volunteers. I can't imagine this anti-canvassing whatever is something that ''just'' the WMF can accomplish, and if that's the case, it seems like a much larger problem. [[User:Legoktm|Legoktm]] ([[User talk:Legoktm|talk]]) 02:07, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
+==== Statement by BilledMammal (General facts) ====
+I am grateful that the committee has chosen to do this publicly and applaud this move towards increased transparency.
+However, I am concerned that this is quickly turning into a witch-hunt, with editors tossing out accusations with little to no evidence, accusations that in a different forum would result in a boomerang as often as not.
+I think it would be beneficial for the committee to instruct editors to avoid issuing accusations unless they have some form of evidence for them, and to remind editors that posting unsupported accusations - casting [[WP:ASPERSIONS|aspersions]] - can result in sanctions. 02:59, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
 ==== Statement by {other-editor} (General facts) ====