Talk:List of terrorist incidents in July 2019

Military attacks are not terrorism

The generally understood definition of terrorism is political violence targeting noncombatant populations, yes? So if the only targets are military, especially in cases where a paramilitary force engages in the attack in an active warzone, it's rather pushing the boundaries of terrorism to include them on this list. I've seen new entries like this twice today. What rationale is being used for inclusion? Simonm223 (talk) 16:03, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Could you please wait until this issue is discussed and stop this edit-war? Thanks.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 16:44, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

What edit war? I literally was just WP:BOLD and haven't reverted oncereverted any given edit more than once! Simonm223 (talk) 16:57, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Now could @11S117: please explain the rationale for including strikes that are on military targets in warzones as terrorist attacks? Simonm223 (talk) 16:59, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Since, you know, they reverted my edits without any edit summary. Simonm223 (talk) 17:00, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I think, every attacks are included, if they are done for political, religious or ideological reasons. The target seems to be irrelevant.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 17:08, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Should we then include every military action undertaken by the US military in the month of July? I'm sure they constituted attacks for political reasons. What about military actions by the IDF, would they constitute terrorism? Because right now the definition you're trying to use for this list, by including attacks by militaries or paramilitaries on militaries or paramilitaries without civilian targets, is inordinately broad and subject either to ridiculous extremes such as I just proposed or, alternatively, WP:NPOV situations where, if we don't like them, it's terrorism but if we like them it's not. Simonm223 (talk) 17:11, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

State terrorism is not included.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 17:16, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

But you include attacks by the Taliban, who are a military power and the former rulers of Afghanistan, and who most credible diplomatic sources suggest will have to be included in Afghanistan in some way for the war there to include. Simonm223 (talk) 17:18, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

So state terrorism is not included if the US recognizes the government? Should all actions undertaken by the government of Venezuela be labeled terrorism? Do any WP:RSes support any given act is terrorist? Simonm223 (talk) 17:18, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

State terrorism is never included.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 17:20, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Then you should delete every Taliban attack from the list as they have a (disputed) claim to be the leaders of the state of Afghanistan. Simonm223 (talk) 17:21, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

And again, I have to return to the question of whether any of the RSes you use for this list actually, unambiguously label an attack as being terrorism. Simonm223 (talk) 17:22, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

If you are of this opinion, start a debate about that. But it is not the right way to just delete a huge amount of text without asking for the POV of others.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 17:24, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

And please, read the introduction of this list once again.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 17:26, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

The introduction of the list is not a lampshade for ignoring WP:RS requirements, nor for ignoring WP:MOS requirements as laid out in WP:TERRORIST - right now this list ignores both. Simonm223 (talk) 17:34, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

So are you going to fix the failure to use reliable sources for inclusion or should I propose an AfD per WP:TNT. Because my brief attempt at improvement led me to being accused of editwarring (what even is WP:AGF?) after I made reverts to two different edits, with detailed edit summaries, and discussion at talk supporting both reverts using a clear rationale for why I made the reverts. Simonm223 (talk) 17:37, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

An exercise in WP:RS checking

Let's look at the first item on the list as an example:

1. [1] Not a reliable source at all. Notwithstanding that, they only quote third parties stating the attack is terrorist. They don't support inclusion.
2. [2] Quotes third parties claiming the attack was terrorism but don't state the attack is terrorist. Doesn't support inclusion.
3. [3] This source is of dubious reliability. The word terrorist does not appear in it. Doesn't support inclusion.
4. [4] This source is of dubious reliability - it actually does identify the attack unambiguously as terrorism.
5. [5] Blocked by a paywall. But I'd bet my eye teeth the NYT doesn't call this bombing a terrorist attack in unambiguous language.
6. [6] Reuters is an excellent source (by journalism standards) it does not mention the word terrorist.
7. [7] Another Reuters article. Again no mention of terrorism.

So here we have, out of seven refs, only one, a news agency from Bulgaria of dubious provenance actually says this incident was terrorism. And I'll note, this is one of the ones I didn't delete. Simonm223 (talk) 17:31, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Now do I have to refer you to the standard set by WP:TERRORIST? Because this page is grossly out of sync with Wikipedia standards. Simonm223 (talk) 17:33, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Could you ask that someone who is responsible for most of the entrys and maybe someone whose first language is English? Thanks.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 17:39, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I'm asking on the article page. And you'll note I pinged the person who reverted me without edit summary; they have not deigned to reply. Simonm223 (talk) 17:40, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Regardless, I've pinged the current events noticeboard for some help cleaning up this mess. How many months of these currently exist? Simonm223 (talk) 18:05, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Far too many - I've been involved in some of these but not for a while. Look through the old talk pages. Doug Weller talk 18:25, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

That's what I was worried about. Simonm223 (talk) 18:33, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I wish there was a way to find out which talk pages/articles I was involved with! Doug Weller talk 18:42, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Yeah the fact you've made several thousand edits this year doesn't make it eassier! LOL Simonm223 (talk) 18:51, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

At the very least you were active on List of terrorist incidents in October 2016. I figured if I ran the interaction analyzer between you and Sokrates2987 it'd return a partial list. Simonm223 (talk) 18:54, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) clever. Nor does the fact that there are so many articles for each year. But looking through the year talk pages rather than the month, I found some still active editors expressing concern. Of course cleaning them up would take a squad! Still, I'll ping some. @EvergreenFir, InedibleHulk, NewsAndEventsGuy, and The Banner:. Doug Weller talk 18:55, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

OK, I'm going to take a second stab at this list, taking off anything which has 0 RSes unambiguously calling the incident terrorism. However I will be lenient with what I constitute an RS, a second sweep probably a good idea.

Alright I'm part-way through July 4 and am out of time for today. Simonm223 (talk) 19:55, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

@Doug Weller: Thanks for the ping. It's been a while since I've done these lists. Gave up to be honest. But i'll be happy to help out. EvergreenFir (talk) 02:43, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Ehm? I do not remember when I was active in this area. Rather vague I remember that somebody was nourishing its own Israeli-Palestinian Conflict by adding every thing done by the Israeli Army. But knowing how much emotion are active in that field, I tiptoed out quite quickly. But if you need my help, I am here. Just direct me. The Banner talk 20:02, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping and thanks for your attention in this area. I have my hands full elsewhere however. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 20:40, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

If I recall, this was an exercise in futility that shortened my life by 40 months. Best to just roll over and accept the new system where everyone who kills or wounds anyone for any reason except sex is a terribly terrifying terrorist with presumed links to terror. Especially if they use weapons! InedibleHulk (talk) 21:33, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I smoked the freshest chunk of shit for old time's sake, but I can stop whenever I want. Unless everybody else starts doing it. Fighting peer pressure is the hardest part in any revolution/insurgency/liberation, after all. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:01, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Fun Fact: In Fall 2015, I also declared futility, singled out the Syrian War against Western terrorists and noted a poor source's blood moon/end of days reporting. Today the "news" is again about a "half-blood moon" and the rest, and another guy who hates me personally restores bullshit with an edit summary hoping to ban me for stupid reasons. Small world. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:36, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Hmm usually for these list-style articles, only entries for which articles exist are included (indicating the event's notability)... —PaleoNeonate – 22:27, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I agree. The WP:LISTCRITERIA for this list should be (at least): 1) notable (has an article) and 2) consensus of RS describe it as "terrorism". (Also, why is the title "terrorist incident" and not "attack"? Are there types of terrorist incidents that aren't attacks?) After removing all of the entries that don't meet the list criteria, I expect we'll find that there are few enough that they can all fit into the List of terrorist incidents in 2019 article, and thus all these monthly articles could be deleted. – Levivich 01:57, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I support this proposal, because it makes perfect sense from an organizational viewpoint and would allow readers to find the terrorist attacks, the whole terrorist attacks and nothing but the terrorist attacks. I remain haunted by my November 17, 2015 prophecy that "this article is irreparably doomed to suck", but hopefully that's still just the drugs talking. (I was right about using "trump" as a verb to covfefe "fake news" before it was uncool, though.) InedibleHulk (talk) 03:03, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Comment - I honestly gave up on these lists a while back. A hard sneeze that vaguely sounds like "A la hulk bar" gets labeled as terrorism by Western sources. I'd be in favor of any proposal to severely limit these lists. At the very least, sources must call the attack "terrorism" or some non-politician state agency must do so. EvergreenFir (talk) 03:20, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Hulk has a bar, too?! To the Hulk bar! What if we made the LISTCRITERIA "must have an article in Category:Terrorist incidents" (Why do we call them "incidents"?) and then we can argue article-by-article if it belongs in that category, but whatever is in that category gets on the list, and nothing else. – Levivich 03:40, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Hulk have keg out back, no need bar! Of course, it's been out there since 2003, probably warm. Keiths' in the fridge, just don't forget to grab me one each time. Weed is under the coffee table, smokes are in the freezer. Other stuff is elsewhere at any given time, unless you swear you're not a cop and take the Lord's name in vain to prove it! TV says a fake cop can be told by his high-top sneakers and incredibly foul mouth, can't be too safe, you know. Speaking of which (and yes, I still like your idea, too), what kind of non-political state agency we talkin' here, comrades? Police? Royalty? Military? The TV? Shadow government? Secret society? Think tank? Neural network? The TV? First Nations? United Nations? Council on Foreign Relations? World Bank? World Book of Knowledge? Better Business Bureau of Paranormal Affairs? Switzerland, as a whole? InedibleHulk (talk) 04:04, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

About checking sources. I have requested review Talk:List of terrorist incidents in November 2016#Please review about an attack in November 2016. It seams that the source is screaming much harder that the facts. (But I was too tired last night to chop it straight away) The Banner talk 07:22, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

@EvergreenFir, InedibleHulk, NewsAndEventsGuy, The Banner, and Simonm223: I think this needs wider attention. RSN seems the appropriate place and I'm thinking an RfC. That way we might recruit more help to clean the mess up. Doug Weller talk 07:52, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

RfCs always seem appropriate early on, but then they grow up and everyone realizes they chose a side for different reasons and will accept various compromises on their way to whatever they get out of voting. We need a constitution or core group of like-minded zealots first. But even before that, we need a clear leader; are you the man for the job? I'm too slow and unreliable. InedibleHulk (talk) 08:12, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I do not want to be a leader too. First, it does not fit my style, second I do not know how long I will be down following surgery that I expect within the next couple of weeks. The Banner talk 08:30, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Every ragtag bunch of underdogs needs someone rooting from a hospital precariously dependent on the result of the big game. "Do It for The Banner", our banner could say, really grab those swing voters. All you'd need to do is promise us you won't die. InedibleHulk (talk) 09:39, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Frankly, I think the most serious issue here is the blatant socking on this page. Everybody knows Hulk and Banner are the same person. – Levivich 16:23, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Honestly I just want to make it to retirement and I'm too old for this shit. (But doubly honestly the only reason I started making noise about this article is because I was accused of edit warring the second I started removing dubious items from the list. So far I've had my first thrust (removing items with exclusively military targets) completely reverted without comment or edit summary and the same editor reverted part of my second attempt at an edit involving a toll booth in Germany. I'd rather have some outside observers willing to pipe in with either, "no this was a righteous edit, please stop silent reverts," or alternatively to rein me in if my tendency to get grumpy about poorly defined lists subject to obvious systemic bias gets the better of me.) Simonm223 (talk) 09:53, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

OK, I've finished my first pass, removing articles where there were not reliable sources or where the reliable sources refer to an event such that it might be some other sort of violence rather than terrorism. A few general notes on sourcing below:

1. Xinhua almost never calls middle eastern violence terrorism except when it targets Iran. This is a WP:NPOV issue with the source, but that doesn't mean we can infer that the events were terrorist. For the record, using Xinhua to claim any Houthi attack was terrorism is never going to fly.
2. Don't try using Turkish pro-government sources to establish that the PKK are terrorists. First off there's the whole issue of whether there's legitimacy to the Kurdish Democratic Confederalism model, which Wikipedia definitely should not be trying to answer. But most significantly, the POV is too blatant. If you can find a reliable source that doesn't have strong ties to the Turkish government making that claim it'd be possible, but considering the complicated realpolitik surrounding Kurdish militias in Syria I doubt you'll find it.
3. Sputnik News and RT are both well known purveyors of disinformation. Don't even start trying to use them as RSes for anything, ever.
4. Much like with Xinhua, it's very unlikely that Reuters will ever explicitly call something terrorist. It's important to read the article first. The word "militant" is not synonymous with terrorist when dealing with a war zone. Nor is the word "insurgent". Simonm223 (talk) 15:45, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Nor extremist, nor fundamentalist, nor guerrila. I called a kindly 95-year-old Danish opthamologist an "insurgent spy" here yesterday, and meant it as a compliment. She probably would have been glad to hear it if she hadn't been dead for twelve days when we met. Nor nationalist, nor socialist, nor communist, for that matter. Assassins are where things get tricky. Is "Sirhan Sirhan" inherently scarier than it is funny? Nobody knows. Nor Islamist, nor Marxist, nor Fascist, for that matter. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:32, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

And I see that @11S117: has already started reverting my edits without discussion or edit summaries. I've left them a lv. 3 disruptive editing warning at their talk page. If they revert anything on this page subsequent to replying either there or here I'll take the matter to WP:AN/I. Simonm223 (talk) 15:52, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for your work bringing this list closer to WP:V, Simonm223. I hope you don't think I was being too hasty, but there is a clear 3RR violation and I left a template warning yesterday, so I saw no reason to wait, and filed the ANEW report. What do you think about limiting the list criteria to articles in Category:Terrorist incidents per my comment above? I wonder if we should formalize a list criteria so that we can do another pass of editing (and potentially merging to the annual list, so there are fewer pages to watchlist). – Levivich 16:09, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Naw, it's fine. I spend a bit more time than I'd like on the drama board because I deal with articles about WP:FRINGE political ideologies and they're magnets for all kinds of conflict, so when something like this comes up I generally try to give lots of WP:ROPE but if somebody else pulls the trigger I'm not bothered. Simonm223 (talk) 16:10, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

As for your criterion limit proposal, I Support it. I figured I was being WP:BOLD enough with my first round of cuts though so I didn't want to pare the list back that far without thorough discussion here first. Simonm223 (talk) 16:12, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Vandalism in Germany

@11S117: Please explain why you reverted my removal of a vandalism incident in Germany. The source does not call the incident terrorism - I was able to review it despite it being in German - and I fail to understand how anyone would consider an incident of vandalism against an automated toll booth to be terrorist activity. Simonm223 (talk) 09:49, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Maybe because the state security of Germany, which is responsible for investigating terrorist incidents, investigates in the case.--Sokrates2987 (talk) 18:42, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, that's a little weak. Regardless, the source doesn't call this an act of terrorism, and frankly if we get to the point where we have consensus to remove non-notable events I'm deleting it altogether. It's a nothing. Simonm223 (talk) 18:49, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

If you choose the mention of terrorism in the source as the only criteria for these lists, you can delete around 80 % of the entries. Have fun doing that <3--Sokrates2987 (talk) 13:27, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

Xinhua

As an aside, I am slightly amused that after the Falun Gong battles over Chinese news sources, the principle RS used on this list is Xinhua. I guess it is reliable after all... (I mean it's journalism so I am still going to be a grump about its over-use, but I've always said Xinhua was no less reliable than any other wire service.) Simonm223 (talk) 12:55, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Criteria and event notability

Creating this section to discuss, in detail the proposal by Levivich that the list criteria be

1. notable (has an article)
2. consensus of RS describe it as "terrorism"

So far I've made a start on #2. The question becomes whether to pare back the list to only notable incidents of terrorism or to include all incidents for which reliable sources exist.

• As I mentioned above, I Support both criteria although I only enacted the second as I felt it would be too WP:BOLD to enact the first without allowing thorough discussion. Simonm223 (talk) 17:12, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
• Support (obviously), although I think it may be simpler to say "all entries must have articles in Category:Terrorist incidents". Presumably if the entry is linked to an article in that category, it's notable and the consensus of RS describe the incident attack as "terrorism". – Levivich 03:08, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
• Support - longtime consensus (dont ask me starting when, it predates my time on the project) is that uncreated (redlinked) should not be added to list articles as it runs afoul of WP:INDISCRIMINATE; the exception is articles that are likely to have proper articles in the near future, as noted by WP:CSC. As for point #2, Wikipedia should reflect what is found in WP:RS, and so only consider events terror attacks if named as such in said reliable sources. SamHolt6 (talk) 03:27, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Terrorist attacks. Or acts of terrorism. "Terror attack" is just a convenient soundalike in breaking speculative news. But can also mean real (or truly alleged) terrorism, usually in the UK. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:44, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

• Support - (Also as one of the proposers.) Notability demonstrated by the existence of, and link to, an article, is common practice with list-style articles on Wikipedia and helps a lot against random or pointy additions. As for sources describing it as terrorism, this is also a common requirement and I remember past related discussions about this, but I somehow currently failed to find the relevant link. As for necessitating that an article be part of the category, I'm less inclined to agree, as categories are commonly applied to articles and article/category links don't require a supporting source; sources used in the article text must be used for verification anyway. —PaleoNeonate – 03:38, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
• Comment – I am afraid this discussion is occurring in too small a corner of Wikipedia. There are more 70+ articles of this type (List of terrorist incidents in MONTH YEAR). We should consider how this applies to them as well and how applying this standard to this list alone will be strange. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 04:22, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

  That's a worthwhile concern, I also don't see an official RFC tag here; the discussion is currently mostly about this article. —PaleoNeonate – 06:49, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

• Adjourn, you maniacs! Too soon, too vague, too far away. We need one proposal and two options. Fine with moot debate, as long as we don't publicize or tag it yet. Sorry for calling you a bunch of maniacs earlier. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:34, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
• Support Yes, the discussion takes place in a small corner of Wiki-World. But as a first attempt to get all noses directing in (roughly) the same direction, it is worth working at. So, start with the "Working-team", then widen the publicity. There are many more WikiProject that set and enforce their notability guidelines. So why not us??
• On the other hand, a reduction of the article to "having an article" will lead to a missive cull of entries. For example, List of terrorist incidents in November 2016 will loose some 75% of its entries. That will create opposition. As an interim measure, I suggest to limit the cull to entries with less then X victims (precise details yet to be determined). The Banner talk 08:31, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
• Point of order If this is an informal discussion, why are we using bold letters and ceremonial bullets? Realism? Dr. Banner is right, it won't feel real till the ravenous waves of Old World boobirds wash our tiny ray of ideal sunshine all the way to hell. That's not just realism, it's reality. If we're still shooting the shit when we need to shoot down dragon-sized arguments from "them", we're toast. In an RfC on Death, you win or you're toast: the middle ground is just endless default setting, no consensus forever, eternal bullshit. We can't break a wheel by rotating in the same tired and predictable cycle the top is going. We need to swerve the carriage of destiny as it approaches a milestone, and that means dealing with the horseman himself, if you catch my drift. Rhymes with Whales. Who's up for diplomatic intrigue and poker instead of conventional slaughter? I can't go myself, I'm Epicurean. InedibleHulk (talk) 11:13, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
• Comment. I raised this question a couple of years ago, but I will raise it again here. "Consensus of reliable sources" must be "consensus of uninvolved reliable sources". My concern of two years ago was that the Ukrainian government started an unfortunate practice of referring to separatists from Donetsk and Luhansk Democratic republics as "terrorists", which lead to a large number of incidents happening there landing on this list. Now, these guys are not exactly champions of human rights, but there is ambush going on there, and both sides (Ukrainian army and separatists) aim at each other but occasionally there are casualties among civil population from both sides of the demarkation line. This is not terrorism in any sense (and actions of the Ukrainian army is not terrorism ether), but of course every Ukrainian-language sourse refers to them as terrorists. These sources must be just excluded and not counted for consensus.--Ymblanter (talk) 11:25, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

  Btw shouldn't this be a RfC?--Ymblanter (talk) 11:29, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

• Support (2): I think we should be careful to ensure that incidents here listed are described by RS as "terrorism". Bondegezou (talk) 12:36, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

See Talk:List of terrorist incidents in March 2019 for some prior discussion on this point. Bondegezou (talk) 12:37, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

I mean that's the thing - these lists are based on WP:CRUFT with people combing wire services for any paramilitary attack involving Muslims. Most RSes (especially central asian wire services) are far too nuanced to even call really awful paramilitaries like IS terrorism in unambiguous terms, let alone a group like the Taliban with de-facto control over parts of Afghanistan and a disputed claim to governance of the country. Simonm223 (talk) 14:18, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

• Support but note that this would only apply to this article. We need an RfC, probably at - I don't know, RSN if they'll let us. Doug Weller talk 16:38, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

  Maybe at the parent article, List of terrorist incidents? – Levivich 02:45, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

• Support. As I mentioned in CEN § List of terrorist incidents in July 2019 WP:CEN § List of terrorist incidents in July 2019, "terrorist" is a contentious label, and the placement of any entry on this list should be considered an exceptional claim needing verification of the "terrorist" label from multiple high-quality sources. — Newslinger talk 22:18, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

  Your first link is "vague and problematic", some might say. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:12, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

  I think the link is supposed to go to WP:CEN § List of terrorist incidents in July 2019. – Levivich 02:45, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

  Yes, that's right. Thanks. — Newslinger talk 03:09, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose #1 for now and Support #2 — Criteria #2 is obvious I think we all seem to agree; an incident should not come near this list unless a consensus of RS label it a terrorist incident. I think #1 is going too far at this moment. This list is a perfect balance between WP:DELAY and WP:RAPID. Criteria #1 would remove too many good starting points for future articles and create a rush for people to create stub articles to retain an item on this list or enter this list in the first place. Emulating #Guidelines, a better standard may be :
  • #1A — The terrorist act has its own article OR resulted in at least 10 deaths OR at least 20 casualties (deaths + serious injury).

We can then make exceptions to be made on a case by case basis for particularly notable incidents with fewer casualties but, if they are particularly notable, they should have their own article anyway. We can adjust the numbers but simulating the results on June 2019 looks to have a good balanced result. BTW, we should put the #Guidelines in a template consistently transcluded across all these articles. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 14:40, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

• • • I find that WP:RAPID is almost always used in such a way as to violate WP:NOTNEWS which I feel should take precedence in an encyclopedia. Simonm223 (talk) 12:26, 22 July 2019 (UTC)
• Comment In that case, the article ought to be renamed as "List of notable terrorist incidents", if there is no intention of including all unambiguous terrorist acts. Incidentally, as far as I can see the notability of an incident is largely defined by news coverage, and not necessarily the number of casualties or even rarity. In this sense, some more rigorous criteria should be applied, though I haven't any good idea of what those might be.
  • Basing selection on casualties rather than coverage by reliable sources would be WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. The thing is that, while Wikipedia tries to be exhaustive, it must first be verifiable. And especially, as per MOS:TERRORIST, we must be careful with our labeling that we avoid inserting a WP:SYSTEMICBIAS into our articles. For instance, should we list every incident where a person is suspected of violence connected to the Turkistan Islamic Party? Because if we do, that's going to change the Xinjiang Conflict article POV pretty seriously. And that's the thing once you start calling paramilitary actions in an active conflict zone terrorism. It's not unambiguous. The boundaries are fluid. Is a civilian who kills a soldier a terrorist? What about one who kills ten soldiers? What about one who kills ten soldiers and one other civilian? Or one who kills ten police officers serving a disputed government? So what do we do? We cleave to what the sources say. Carefully. And if that means our list is incomplete, so be it. Simonm223 (talk) 16:11, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
    • Not quite what I meant. Plenty of verified terrorist incidents are not widely, or prominently, reported for reasons pertaining to audience tastes. Are these "notable" or not? Furthermore, some standard independent of the usual sources ought to be used if the list is to reflect anything more than the views of prominent editorial boards, and these must come from the (extensive) literature on terrorism; if an article refused to call a tool with a sharp-edged, typically rectangular, metal blade and a long handle, used for digging or cutting earth a spade, that shouldn't stop us from declaring it a spade.

Yuen Long

Please see Talk:2019 Yuen Long Terrorist Attack#"Terrorist Attack"? – Levivich 00:12, 23 July 2019 (UTC)

Many high-profile attacks missing

The list has not been updated since July 15, despite no apparent let-up in the quantity of notable attacks (many involving a high number of casualties), and given editing restrictions I am unable to rectify the issue. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jingo12321 (talk • contribs)

Please submit an edit request. El_C 16:00, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

~ There seems to be a differing of opinion as to what constitutes a "terrorist" incident. I am sure that all sources cannot exaggerate or be wrong. As a casual observer, some people apparently have had their feelings hurt and have locked the page up to where nothing can be added. If it is proven not to be a terrorist act then remove it but at least the page should be opened to allow for additions. Kgriff2002 (talk) 20:31, 29 July 2019 (UTC)kgriff2002Kgriff2002 (talk) 20:31, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

It's not about feelings or proving negatives. If you find some high-profile attack that's called terrorism, you're welcome to add it (or share it here while you're locked out). But don't bother with attacks that aren't called terrorism, regardless of whether they arguably should be (for fame, number of dead, location, religion, group membership or anything else you can think up). InedibleHulk (talk) 23:28, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

I think it's strange to demand that each and every terrorist incident be labelled as such in the articles which report on them. An attack is terroristic if it meets the definition for terrorism, and if an article chooses not to place a particular label on it (often because the perpetrator is taken to imply a terrorist motive; many bombings by ISIS, even against civilians, have not been labelled "terrorism", so presumably even these do not qualify?) then that is simply unimportant. If the incident is an "attack", carried out by a terrorist group, which meets all generally accepted criteria, in an essentially identical fashion to previous attacks which are labelled terroristic, it is absurd to not include them. Note that this would involve removing multiple IRA, Loyalist, LTTE, PKK, PFLP etc. attacks, as the term "terrorism" is often not used in reference to certain events.

See WP:OR - we don't get to decide what's terrorism and what is not. We need to be told. Simonm223 (talk) 16:31, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

We don't have to.

Please sign your posts. And if you want to add items to this list, you need reliable sources supporting the incidents were terrorism. Simonm223 (talk) 16:48, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Once again, if an article does not use the term "terrorism", that does not mean we cannot list it as terrorism, provided a set of established criteria are met. I see no reason why the definition given on the WikiProject Terrorism (which is in line with essentially all of the literature) should not be used. The new rules have already left the July list unreliable, and will effectively render it of no use to anyone. For example This would not be classed as terrorism under the present system. Such a result invalidates the whole thing. Jingo12321 (talk) 12:06, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Kgriff2002 (talk) 16:56, 1 August 2019 (UTC)When is the list for July going to be updated? Nothing has been listed since 7/15. no one can tell me that there hasn't been anything occurring in two weeks. Also, the list for August has not been brought online.Kgriff2002 (talk) 16:56, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Any incident that is supported by WP:RS can be added. This page is only under Extended Confirmed protection so most editors will be able to revise it. Simonm223 (talk) 17:04, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

The 1 July 2019 Kabul attack, 22 July 2019 Mogadishu bombing, 24 July 2019 Mogadishu bombing & 28 July 2019 Kabul suicide bombing clearly fit the terrorism criteria. The Taliban & al-Shabaab aren't legitimate combatants. Jim Michael (talk) 16:38, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Again, it doesn't matter whether we consider a group to be, "legitimate combatants" - what matters is what can be reliably sourced. Truth is slippery, Wikipedia aims for verifiability. This is doubly the case in areas that are covered by WP:BLPCRIME which we need to be careful regarding WP:LABEL issues surrounding. Remember that WP:BLP applies to the recently deceased too. Simonm223 (talk) 14:43, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

The Taliban and Al-Shabab are considered terrorist organizations by a number of governments throughout throughout the world. If it is proven that they are responsible for an attack then by all means they should be listed. Extended Confirmation has expired which means any incident can be entered by others instead of only the chosen few.Kgriff2002 (talk) 10:30, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

Are considered by whom? Wikipedia must remain neutral; which is why we depend on reliable sources and avoid WP:SYNTH. If reliable sources call a Taliban action terrorism, so can we. If no reliable sources can be found to support an assertion such as this, we cannot comment on it. Please review WP:V for additional information. Simonm223 (talk) 14:41, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

Basically what it comes down to folks is that, if it's so obvious these groups are terrorist, you should have no trouble finding sources calling their actions terrorist. If such sources cannot be found, perhaps the situation is more complex than it seems from your WP:POV. Simonm223 (talk) 14:45, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

You're saying that even when attacks are assigned (by themselves or the government of the country the attack took place in) to what is known to be a terrorist group - such as ISIL, al-Shabaab, Taliban, FARC, RIRA etc. - that's not sufficient to list them here? Terrorist groups rarely call themselves terrorist, so this requirement would be that news articles state that specific bombings, shootings etc. were terrorist - not merely that the perpetrators of the attacks are. Jim Michael (talk) 05:20, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

I'm saying that some of those groups (notably ISIL, the Taliban and FARC) claim to be the legitimate government of their respective regions. Therefore, it would violate WP:NPOV for us to claim explicitly that their military or paramilitary actions are terrorist by default. It would also violate WP:SYNTH to say, "The Taliban are called terrorist in source A, Source B says the Taliban did this action, therefore this action is terrorism." It's not required we sympathize with any of these parties, but it is required we, organizationally, remain neutral. And that means, no, we can't unambiguously call every military action the Taliban undertakes terrorism. Simonm223 (talk) 13:56, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

None of them actually are the legitimate government of any country, and only the Taliban have power over a significant proportion of a country.

How about attacks which target civilians? How can they be regarded as legitimate military actions rather than terrorist attacks? Jim Michael (talk) 08:11, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

RfC: terrorist incidents list criteria

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:List of terrorist incidents#RfC: List criteria. – Levivich 18:01, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

off topic digression - was this posted to the wrong section?
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The Taliban are a terrorist organization. Another arbitrary decision made. Kgriff2002 (talk) 13:52, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Ref-spamming isn't necessary

@Flaughtin: TwoFour of the refs you included do unambiguously call that incident a terrorist one. The rest do not. Rather than spamming half a dozen irrelevant refs, in the future, please read them and include only those that support inclusion on this list please. Simonm223 (talk) 12:03, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Re-read and four of the refs are at least vaguely supportive of inclusion. I've deleted those that either don't support inclusion or aren't reliable sources. EX: Epoch Times is not a reliable source. It's a propaganda outlet of a new religious movement. Simonm223 (talk) 12:14, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

While I don't disagree with removing it as "not necessary", I do object to calling Deutsche Welle an unreliable source. I could find nothing on WP:RSN that suggests that it's not a WP:RS. Sjö (talk) 12:59, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Look in the WP:RS/N archives there's several discussions of DW.com as a source. As I said in my edit summary, the DW issue is not a hill I intend to die on - but it was also peripheral to the inclusion of this item on the list. Which had actual support from four other sources that are unambiguously reliable sources. Simonm223 (talk) 13:01, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

I checked again, but I couldn't find any. I found one archive explicitly mentioning Deutsche Welle as a reliable source. I think that you confused it with DailyWire.com, sometimes called DW. Sjö (talk) 13:22, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

I mean stranger things have happened. Simonm223 (talk) 13:45, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

@Simonm223:Well no actually it turns out it was necessary for me basically hold your hand and include all those (relevant) references because you were for some weird reason trying your hardest to get rid of as many of them as possible in the same manner as when you got rid of the whole item itself as you did here. It really makes no sense - "unambiguously call that incident a terrorist one." and "didn't describe the incident as terrorism" Really, what the hell do these things even mean? THAT'S WHAT I DID HERE WHEN I CITED THE QUOTE BY THAT UNMAS OFFICIAL. What he said was exactly the same thing that Guterres said in the AP sources (which you left). And then you left in the NYT and Washington Post sources, even though by your definitional "criteria" they shouldn't even be there because they didn't describe the Farah bombing as a terrorist incident anywhere near as unambiguously as the Reuters one did. I have no idea what why you didn't just leave my initial edit as it was and instead had to waste everybody's time by starting this completely meaningless exchange. Maybe this is all part of your plan to just prove a point and give the Taliban or whoever the hell was behind that bombing some extra credence because they are fighting a particular country, an organization, or whatever that you don't particularly like - I don't know what the motivation is...and I don't particularly care. The main thing that matters is: did what you do make sense. (It doesn't.) Not my problem that you didn't read the sources and think through your arguments clearly, but that really isn't a reason for you to do this purge of the sources using what I think we can both agree is pretty illogical reasoning. That said, you didn't revert the item wholesale as you did last time so that's a start.

As for your reverts, let's eviscerate them one-by-one:

#1 - Makes no sense. The Reuters one I've already described why it should be included, it's basically no differen tthan the AP one you kept in. The LWJ quote I cited (A roadside bomb planted by the Taliban in the western Afghan province of Farah killed 35 civilians and wounded 27 today. But the Taliban continues to deny responsibility for attacks that clearly target civilians.) meets a (another) definition of terrorism that you gave earlier in this talk page (The generally understood definition of terrorism is political violence targeting noncombatant populations, yes?)

#2 - False. Here's what Wikipedia actually says about the Epoch Times: There is no consensus on the reliability of The Epoch Times. Most editors classify The Epoch Times as an advocacy group for the Falun Gong, and consider the publication a biased or opinionated source whose statements should be attributed. Some editors question the publication's suitability when assessing the notability of controversial issues, and caution not to provide undue weight to this source. None of this crap about how it's a propaganda channel. Unlike, of course, the shitrag state run outlet Xinhua that per WP:PUS and just common sense is actually an unreliable source on Wikipedia for anything that doesn't state the official views of the fascist government of the PRC. And, of course, you will note the double standards when you compare your Epoch Times comments with what you said about you Xinhua as reliable and journalism even though we all know it's neither. We can debate whether or not it's necessary to use the source, but let's be clear the whole exclude-the-source-outright-because-it-is-propaganda "argument" just isn't going to work.

#3 - the source is obviously describing the incident as a terrorist attack that's why it explicitly used the word terrorist...to describe the group that may have been behind it. Nobody cares bout this nonsensical claim of yours that there is this imaginary guideline about "claiming responsibility" in order for things to be included - plenty of items with perpetrators listed as "unknown" that are nevertheless included in this article.

#4 - DW is a reliable source, as has already been explained to you. ([8] and [9]) It is no different than, say, the BBC and, of course, definitely more reliable than (you guessed it) the shitrag state run outlet: Xinhua. I put the source in because it gives the Afghan government's POV of the incident as terrorist, so it definitely isn't unnecessary. Flaughtin (talk) 15:51, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Please avoid personal attacks. In addition you will note my comments about how terrorism was being defined here were specifically citing them as a problem due to their non-compliance with WP:RS. Simonm223 (talk) 15:56, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

@Simonm223:First things first stop complaining about "personal attacks" and civility as you did here because you obviously aren't in any position to. If you are going to talk about civility, don't then make uncivil comments like "I realize that my skepticism regarding blanket calling Taliban actions terrorism without supporting reliable sources upsets you." (Which doesn't even make sense. I didn't call them Taliban actions because, as the sources make clear, we don't even know who was behind the attacks.)If you want an example of an uncivil comment, that would actually be it. Perhaps you don't understand the meaning of irony, but for what it's worth it'd be in your best interest to refrain from using those kinds of double standards in the future. (See also: WP:BOOMERANG) That said, I'm not going to get all sensitive about it and start giving you a long, reverse-lectures about civility because I am interested in getting to the real issue at hand.

Moving on.

No but you see now you are changing your argument. Your initial argument had two parts to it: the first part was your malformed criteria about what counted as terrorism. The second part was what you personally thought counted as a reliable source. Both were at play when you did your purge of the sources but now you are trying to make it out as if it was all about the problem with the sourcing. (it wasn't) Obviously you are unaware of what you said/how you even argued earlier, so let's do this annihilation process one by one. Literally

We'll start with the Falun Gong-Xinhua issue. Why would you say that Falun Gong is an unreliable source but that Xinhua is? This doesn't make sense. We all know what Wikipedia's position on Falun Gong is: there is no consensus on the reliability of The Epoch Times. And on the other hand, we al also know (per WP:PUS) what Wikipedia's position on Xinhua is: it's an unreliable source for anything else that does not reflect the fascist views of the government of the PRC. Or, to put it in ordinary language, it's a shitrag. It's a joke. We use it like how we use Der Sturmer for citing the views of the government of Nazi Germany, Rodong Sinmun for citing the views of the government of the DPRK and the Daily Stormer for citing the views of the Grand Wizard of the KKK. Only in limited circumstances, not for anything else and certainly not for an article like this. Clearly you are an experienced editor so I have no idea how you could not have been aware of this (and why you left the sources in the article until I rightly removed them [10] and here). Of course we can talk about the further issue of necessity, attribution, etc. but it's obvious we can't unless we get this issue of reliability out of the way first. Flaughtin (talk) 01:45, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

Reliable sources

Tetsou TheIronman Please make sure that the sources you use describe an incident as terrorism before including them on the list. Even if a group engages in terrorist incidents, they may also engage in conventional military tactics or even governance of a region; as such, we can't define terrorism as "whatever terrorists do" - that would be a circular definition. Your inclusions have been indiscriminate. Please show greater care. Simonm223 (talk) 18:49, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Simonm223 I appreciate that you have control over this page, but i think you should have a more open mind, since the modus operandi are usually varied and if they use military or guerrilla tactics it cannot be a determining factor when it comes to erasing an incident. Have here I leave you the criteria with which I apply the incidents https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/more/Criterion.aspx#one

We have our own criteria. MOS:TERRORIST, WP:RS and WP:NPOV. All I'm asking is that you abide by them. Simonm223 (talk) 17:07, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Edited to add, your interpretation of a WP:PRIMARY source such as the criteria at Start is WP:SYNTH which we also have rules about. Simonm223 (talk) 18:53, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Tetsou TheIronman Please respond to the issues regarding your disregard for Wikipedia criteria rather than just re-inserting incidents without appropriate sources.Simonm223 (talk) 12:46, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

My revert with the statement "failed verification - broken link - was only supposed to capture one of the intermediate edits you made. However I am not self-reverting because my subsequent review did not show any of the incidents you included meeting the necessary criteria. Simonm223 (talk) 12:54, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Tetsou TheIronman Oh right, about WP:RS i see this article more useful and answer my questions, thanks. And in some days my agenda does not allow me to enter wikipedia, my apologies. Tetsou TheIronman: One more thing i do not agree with some parameters that you follow, you could improve, being more flexible