Canadian anti-Israel group to host Wikipedia edit-a-thon honoring ‘martyred’ Palestinians
Jewish Onliner was the first to report on this 'Free Palestine Wiki edit-a-thon,' but it was independently confirmed by The Jerusalem Post.
On October 22, a Canadian pro-Palestinian organization called Artists Against Artwashing (AAA) will host a Wikipedia editing event aimed at populating entries honoring martyred Palestinian artists. The event, which will occur on a Saturday evening, will also feature Palestinian short films, a Wikipedia 101 session, and hands-on editing.
AAA describes itself as a group of arts workers demanding cultural institutions divest from settler colonialism and genocide, with a focus on pressuring arts institutions to cut ties with the Azrieli Foundation, Israel's largest real estate company.
However, Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger has expressed concern that such events risk taking Wikipedia away from its formal core policy, the Neutral Point of View (NPOV). Sanger stated, "If you are organizing people to take a controversial point of view on Wikipedia, that is canvassing [and] they should be blocked."
The event's organizer, WikiBias, has criticized Wikipedia's mission of "remedying the narrative," stating that it contradicts the site's mission of neutrality. Despite Wikipedia's public revision history showing that edits to the Azrieli Group article occurred on April 28, the user who made the edit had no previous edits and was registered that day.
Other accounts made further edits to the page throughout May, leading to a warning for edit warring, a violation of Wikipedia's policy that prohibits repeatedly undoing changes made by other users.
Written by urgent.news from Jerusalem Post's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
