How should the phenomenon of human shields in the I-P conflict be organised on Wikipedia? Here are some options. What are the merits and demerits of each?

1. Usage of human shields by Israelis and Palestinians should be covered in a single article (this one).

2. There should be two separate articles by nationality: Usage of human shields by Israelis and Usage of human shields by Palestinians.

3. There should be a different article for every organization: Usage of human shields by IDF, Usage of human shields by Hamas, Usage of human shields by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Usage of human shields by Israeli police etc.

4. Some other pattern.

Pinging @Rafe87, @Allthemilescombined1, @Sean.hoyland @Ost316, @Chicdat for inputs.VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 02:43, 18 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

4. Accusations of usage of human shields by IDF. Usage of human shields by Hamas. Other organizations can have separate articles titled according to the preponderance of evidence. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 23:30, 18 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Usage of human shields by Israel is a fact beyond dispute by this point. And has been for decades, as the IDF admission to the Israeli Supreme Court that it used Palestinians as human shields 1,200 times during the Second Intifada turns 20 this year. The exact opposite is true of the accusations against Hamas. For all of the favorable bias that Israel enjoys from Western media (which is a matter of academic conclusion rather than personal impression), it's a fact that every two or three months since about October 2024, a Western outlet will release an in-depth report about how the IDF is abusing Palestinians as human shields, and nothing of the type is produced about Hamas's conduct so far. It's absolutely nothing short of uncyclopedic to pretend the situation is the other way around. Rafe87 (talk) 21:46, 19 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

One issue I have is that often times popular media sources don't distinguish between Hamas and other Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip. For example, someone will find some ammunition in a school, and it won't exactly be clear whether Hamas put it there or PIJ etc.

On the Israeli side we have allegations of human shields use by the Israel Border Police (IBP)[1] and I don't think it makes sense to have one article for allegations against IDF and another for allegations against IBP.VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 09:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

2. And inspired by @Allthemilescombined1's suggestion, the article about so-called Palestinian human shield usage should, in my view, reveal right in the title that these are accusations made by politically compromised sources such as the Israeli government and its allies rather than ascertained by independent investigators, so that one article should be titled "Use of human shields by Israel" and the other "Allegations of human shield use against Palestinian factions". Rafe87 (talk) 21:49, 19 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think option 1 is the way to go. It's incredibly common for POV forks to be created for different sides of the same subject in Israel/Palestine articles and I think this is no different. Start with one and split summary style if sections become too large and unwieldy for a single article. JOEBRO⁶⁴ 18:08, 20 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@TheJoebro64, this article is 4800 words and the article on Usage of human shields by Hamas is 5800 words, together they are >10,000 words. Of course, once they are combined a large amount of content would become redundant. Still I think there is enough literature on usage of human shields by Israelis and Palestinians that an expansion would be warranted and we'd come back this same question.VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 09:23, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Vice regent, can you do something about the low amount of input we're getting here? I tried to put a renaming notice on the article, but I'm getting reverted by some bot. Rafe87 (talk) 23:09, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging everyone from the last merge discussion: Raskolnikov.Rev, Tashmetu, Easternsahara, Thebiguglyalien, Hogo-2020, Smallangryplanet, Whizkin, Bitspectator, Huldra, The Great Mule of Eupatoria, Oleg Yunakov, Chicdat, Mason7512, Lililolol, Abu Wan, Allthemilescombined1, Iljhgtn, TheJoebro64, Alaexis, XDanielx. VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 13:13, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I believe we need new voices in the discussion. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 16:57, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I prefer option 1 or if that is not possible then this can be the parent article with child articles following 3 Easternsahara (talk) 13:23, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I would prefer a navigation template be created in the latter case Easternsahara (talk) 13:24, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Easternsahara, If 1 is not possible, what is your opinion of #2? VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 13:28, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with this. Monk of Monk Hall (talk) 16:31, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My main concern is about making articles overly specific. We have the precedent that "Hamas war crimes" was moved to "Palestinian war crimes"[2]. Likewise, war crimes by IDF, Israeli police, Israeli Prison Service etc are all covered under Israeli war crimes. We tend to categorize these things by nationality, rather than by the exact organization. Further, both Israeli and Palestinian forces tend to operate in a coordinated manner such that it is hard to distinguish actions by IDF vs Israeli police, or Hamas vs Palestinian Islamic Jihad. For example, sources like these[3] say things like "Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, and other terror groups choose to employ a policy of “human shields,”" effectively lumping the usage of human shields. VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 17:38, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Just to be clear, I'm leaning towards option 2. I'm undecided whether we should have a generic article "Human shields in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict" at all. For example, we don't have War crimes in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We do have War crimes in the Gaza war, but that article is simply split as "War crimes by Israel" and "War crimes by Palestinian militants" without much common content – it might as well be split into two articles. So in sum, I think the topic should be covered in 3 articles: Usage of human shields by Israeli forces, Usage of human shields by Palestinian militants and Voluntary human shields in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Human shields in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict would become a Wikipedia:Set index articles.VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 17:49, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Go with option 1: I didn't think any of them were long enough to become a standard GA article in the future, and dividing them into sections seemed like the best choice. Lililolol (talk) 18:17, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• It should be in the same article, enough damage has been done in this topic area by splitting things off to separate pages based on who's accusing whom of what. And all of the WP:EXAMPLECRUFT and WP:PROSELINE needs to be wiped out. Isolated examples are not only unhelpful but discouraged by policy. The article should be written by summarizing general sources about the topic, without deviating from what they cover. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 18:18, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  @Thebiguglyalien can you clarify where WP:BALASP discourages WP:SPINOFF articles? SPINOFF articles also seem like a great way to solve WP:DUE issues. For example, suppose we have an article on Human shields in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and suppose most sources on this topic focus on Israeli conduct, then WP:DUE requires most of the content in this article be on Israeli conduct. Spinning out an article on Palestinian conduct will allow for that article's expansion without upsetting the DUE balance in the parent article.VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 20:32, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  I never said WP:BALASP discourages WP:SPINOFF articles. I said it discourages isolated examples. If we remove every instance of "on date, this happened" (a telltale sign of amateur editing), we can easily fit the actual content within a single article. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 20:40, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1: I support the first option for more or less the same reasons I supported an earlier proposal to move Use of human shields by Hamas into Human shields in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. For one, I see no good reason why other articles covering this very topic (e.g. the Hamas article) should be created or continue existing when this page exists and is more than capable of handling all relevant existing information on the subject. In addition, as it stands, regardless of when it was created, the Hamas article seems merely like a POVFORK of the this article. Thirdly, any splitting of this article into separate Israeli and Palestinian articles threatens to introduce significant NPOV issues into the respective articles, especially the Hamas one. Indeed, the existing Hamas article seems to contain such issues as it contains several mentions of unevidenced claims made by Israel and presents them as having equal or greater weight than actual evidence provided to refute those claims. In short, a single article handling this subject is likely to be more NPOV-compliant than split pages dedicated to presenting it from Israeli and Palestinian perspectives. Lastly, it seems to me that, for editorial purposes, having a single article on a subject is much more preferable than multiple articles on the same. Abu Wan (talk) 21:20, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Option 1 is the best option to ensure readers get an accurate picture of documented uses of human shields by both parties in the conflict. EvansHallBear (talk) 17:07, 19 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 2 mostly per VR. This article is near-entirely about Israeli human shield usage as it is. 🐔 Chicdat  ^{Bawk to me!} 11:03, 24 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]