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Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Al Qaida facilitator

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Yamamoto Ichiro 会話 06:38, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Al Qaida facilitator

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Al Qaida facilitator (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

This article has been tagged with {{confusing}} and {{context}}. It is written like some sort of internal report, which assumes widespread knowledge of the matter from the reader. Frankly, I do not see any encyclopedic value to this, nor do I see where this is going. The author made his case on the talk page, but I am utterly unconvinced. I suggested that Wikisource would be a better place for this, to no avail. Blanchardb-Me•MyEars•MyMouth-timed 11:50, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

*Why? Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Broken clamshells•Otter chirps) 03:17, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete An article with this information likely could be written, but this isn't it. Confusing, non-encyclopedic, not in a proper tone, format issues and doesn't seem to be fixable in its current state. Would require a full rewrite. Even then, might not pass AFD. Pharmboy (talk) 13:15, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • The nutshell description that leads WP:DEL explicitly states:

Pages that can be improved should be edited or tagged, not nominated for deletion.

IMO, the opinion expressed above, and several others here, are not compliant with policy, that articles are regarded as needing work should be improved, not deleted. Geo Swan (talk) 20:00, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete agree with all above. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 13:34, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete: The article fails WP:NOTABILITY. Also, Al Qaeda is spelt wrong - 14:05, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
    • That many Guantanamo captives are accused of being "al Qaida facilitators" or of having known "al Qaida facilitators" is well documents, from reliable sources. Captives had their continued detention justified by this allegation. IMO that makes this term notable.
    • Respondent is incorrect that "Al Qaeda is spelled wrong". There are different conventions on how to transliterate Arabic. There is no universally accepted standard. The DoD transliteration scheme is to transliterate it as "al Qaida". Every time the DOD uses the phrase they always write it as "al Qaida facilitator". I think it would be a mistake to correct the phrase, from the way it is written by the DoD. Even if this was a good idea, it is, IMO a very weak justification to delete this article. Geo Swan (talk) 19:54, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete it's too confusing and it has no senseOlliyeah (talk) 14:30, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. It's not an encyclopedia article now, and I don't think it could be. How do you distinguish an "al-Qaeda facilitator" from just a member of al-Qaeda? I don't think anyone would seriously insist on this as a meaningful distinction? Superm401 - Talk 03:43, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Respondent asks: "How do you distinguish an 'al-Qaeda facilitator' from just a member of al Qaeda?"
    • Respondent questions whehter anyone would seriously insist that this was a meaningful distinction.
    • Respondent is overlooking that Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts (1) make exactly this distinction; and (2) in effect insisted it was a serious distinction. The captives named "al Qaida facilitators" had also frequently been distinguished as being "members of al Qaida". Geo Swan (talk) 20:17, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per the above, particularly Superm401 and Pharmboy. I could argue for a (brief) article on this topic if a notable individual affiliated with Al-Qaeda was described as a "facilitator" for the group. An article would be useful in describing the term and why it exists as any sort of distinction between that and other types of Al-Qaeda member. Terrorist itself redirects to Terrorism, so an article on a particular type of terrorist (the facilitator) doesn't seem appropriate, unless context and sources would indicate otherwise. But, I agree - if there's an article in here somewhere, this isn't it. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 15:58, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Well, the allegations against Abu Faraj Al Libi describe him as an "al Qaida facilitator". He is one of the 14 "high value detainees" who President Bush announced would be transferred from custody in the CIA's black sites to military custody in Guantanamo on September 6 2006. Is that notable enough for you?
    • We cover topics that are, necessarily, incompletely covered. Back before Fermat's last theorem was solved, or the four color theorem was solved, we would still have had articles about them. It may be that none of the references currently available to us contain an explanation as to what Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts actually meant by this term. Just like Fermat's last theorem this topic worth covering. Maybe some of the references will contain an explanation as to what JTF-GTMO analysts meant. How could the article exist, without containing an explanation, if that explanation existed? Because checking all the references is hard work, and they haven't all been checked yet. Geo Swan (talk) 20:47, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep the term is notable, because it's put to serious use. At first glance the article appears to be of sufficient quality. Perhaps it was improved since the above voted delete? Mathiastck (talk) 23:38, 4 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge content with the suggestion: contain usable information, but yes, in a confusing way. i think the best is to merge the uable content with the suggested article, them delete this. its talkpage also seems to be a battlefield --Drhlajos (talk) 18:12, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. I am the person who put Confusing and Context on the article in the first place. I did not mean this to be a prelude to deletion. I would have used Prod if that is what I intended. I just wanted the article to be easier to understand. Clearly there is a notable subject here and, while work is needed to make the article more useful, it should be kept. --DanielRigal (talk) 00:40, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Suggestion. My thought is that we should not list the specific detainees in the article. After all, they have never been charged with, or convicted of, being Al Qaida facilitators. I think that the detainees should be listed in a separate article. What we need in this article is an explanation of what various people mean by the phrase "Al Qaida facilitator". --DanielRigal (talk) 00:52, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that the concept may be a notable one, and state as such in my comment above. However, a discussion of the concept of an Al Qaida Facilitator is different from a list of detainees who have been so described. There isn't anything in the article that tells me what a facilitator actually is, especially in relation to non-terrorist facilitators (i.e. of discussions or debates), or other non-facilitator members of Al Qaida. If there is a source that differentiates between facilitators and non facilitators for Al Qaida, then the background already in the article could serve to document official uses of the term, bolstering the notability that the independent source provided. However, the article as-is would work better as information about the detainees themselves, as opposed to their position in the organization. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 20:00, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I add that, if the only distinction between members of Al Qaida and Al Qaida Facilitators is that the Department of Defense has designated some detainees as facilitators, then this term might be better suited as a subsection of the article on Al Qaida itself. Otherwise, the article would boil down to the following text: "An Al Qaida Facilitator is a member of Al Qaida who has been described as a facilitator by the United States Department of Defense." We need more information on the term itself, not necessarily on those for whom the term has been used. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 20:23, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In response to comments made here by Geo Swan, let me just point out, that if the concept of Al-Qaida facilitator is a notable one, how come the article makes no attempt to explain what one means by Al-Qaida facilitator? How come the article does not even attempt to explain the concept? What is it that makes an Al-Qaida facilitator different than another Al-Qaida member? And how is an al-Qaida facilitator any more notable than, say, a Republican Party facilitator, so that we need a separate article on Al-Qaida facilitators? The article should focus on these two questions. I probably would not have nominated for deletion an article that only tells this difference and mentions no names. Also, the so-called ISN number of each Guantanamo detainee liste is a detail whose removal would actually improve the quality of the article. As far as I can tell, the article on George W. Bush makes no mention of his social security number. What we want is encyclopedia articles intended for people who want basic knowledge about a topic. What we have now is an intelligence report that only a CIA operative would find interesting. I do not think there is anything worth saving as part of an encyclopedia. Ultraexactzz gave the right guidelines on how to start over with this article. And note: start over, not expand. --Blanchardb-Me•MyEars•MyMouth-timed 00:00, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • IMO nominstator's detailed content questions belonged on the article's talk page. Not in {{afd}}
  • Nominator asks for an explanation of how an "al Qaida facilitator" differs from an ordinary "al Qaida" member. From the context one might guess that "al Qaida facilitator" is a synonym for "al Qaida cell leader". Some of the documents will refer to a single individual by both terms. One might guess that JTF-GTMO authors thought the two terms were interchangeable. However, if one of us, the nominator, or myself, or one of the rest of you, were to insert that conclusion in the article that would be a violation of the wikipedia's policy on "no original research".
  • Nominator asks why being accused of being an "al Qaida facilitator" is any more noteworthy than accusing someone of being a "Republican Party facilitator". Well, no one is holding anyone for years, without offering them a meaningful opportunity to challenge the allegations that triggered their detention -- because they are suspected of being members of the Republican Party, of facilitators for the Republican Party.
  • Nominator criticizes the article for its use of the captives ID numbers.
  • As I mentioned above, I strongly believe this kind of detailed criticism of an article's content really belongs on the article's talk page.
  • Why include the ID numbers? Simple. The entries in the list are ambigous without them. Arabic names, and Afghan names are not like the names we are familiar with in the English speaking world. After centuries of international commerce, international conquest, international colonization, English speaking phone books are full of surnames from all over the world. English-speaking people have a rich name-space for surnames. Relatively few individuals have names like John Smith, where they can be confused with their homonyms. This is not so with the Guantanamo captives. About twenty percent of the names of the captives are homonyms. Without using the ID numbers there would be constant confusion over who was being referred to.
  • Nominator mocks this article writing: "What we have now is an intelligence report that only a CIA operative would find interesting." -- It seems to me this concern is just an instance of WP:IDONTLIKEIT. I know, for a certain fact that the wikipedia's articles on war on terror topics are read and appreciated. I've had people reader's write me emails telling me they appreciated articles like this one and found them useful.
  • There are plenty of topics that I find uninteresting that the wikipedia covers. But I wouldn't dream of trying to suppress coverage of those topics. Geo Swan (talk) 04:25, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note to closing admin: I request a relisting because nominator lapse from the normal courtesy of informing the article creator has circumvented the deletion sorting being put to use. Geo Swan (talk) 20:10, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so that consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, JERRY talk contribs 02:43, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In response to a question from the author, I’ll expand on this. Because this article singles out one specific class of detainee and doesn’t address what an Al Qaida facilitator is, I can see no other purpose for this article than to attract attention to these people. —Travistalk 03:55, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Clarify if not enough information is present for an article a wiktionary entry would be applicable instead. — BQZip01 — talk 04:43, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. Not an encyclopedic article. Pavel Vozenilek (talk) 18:15, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. It would be easier to think about things like WP:N if the article could start by defining what an "Al Qaida facilitator" is (or what the DoD means by the term, anyway). That's pretty basic WP:LEAD stuff, and also is pretty much the difference between whether this is indiscriminate info or something which could turn into some kind of informative article. The term does seem to be used enough in US military and white house circles that I could imagine an article, but what we have here is pretty far from what we'd want. (also note the existence of Category:Alleged al-Qaeda facilitators for whatever it is worth). Kingdon (talk) 17:53, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move -- After reading the comments above, and thinking about them, I am changing my suggested action -- from keep to move to something like List of alleged al Qaida officials].
    • Many of the objections above are that the article doesn't define how an alleged "al Qaida facilitator" differs from a garden variety alleged al qaida member.
    • The definition(s) that lie at the root of the invention and use of this term may not have been made public.
    • As Eleland suggested above, this term may be used by junior analysts who merely heard the term, and used it without any acquaintance with the definition(s).
    • Approximately a third of the captives in Guantanamo were accused of being members of the Taliban.
    • Approximately half of the captives in Guantanamo weren't accused of being members of either the Taliban or al Qaida. (I know that adds up to more than 100%. Some captives were accused of being member of BOTH groups.)
    • Of that third -- approximately 170 men -- a minor, but significant fraction were labeled as some sort of al Qaida official. "Al Qaida facilitator" was just one of those labels. Other labels included: "Al Qaida recruiter", "Al Qaida lieutenant", "al Qaida financiers", "al Qaida cell leader", "senior al Qaida operatives.
    • Bearing in mind the comments above I think all these labels could be described as "officials". I think the distinction made between the garden variety captives and those singled out merits coverage, without regard to whether we know the definition of the alleged duties of those singled out.
    • I'd welcome alternatives to "officials", or "officers". Geo Swan (talk) 15:10, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Forgive me if this sounds like nitpicking, but your style of commenting makes the reading of this discussion more difficult and confusing than it needs to be. Using a bullet point for each and every statement is unnecessary and, frankly, distracting. AfD discussions normally have bullets only for major points, i.e. “Delete,” “Keep,” “Comment,” etc., so your extra bullets only serve to make your comments more difficult to follow and understand. Respectfully, —Travistalk 15:30, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: As a Wikisource administrator, I wish to make it clear that this is not the purpose of Wikisource and would not be allowed to be transwikied. As such, I vote "Keep", and remind future voters that Transwiki is not an option. If the information is to be kept anywhere, it must be on WP. Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 23:30, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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