Talk:Beta Israel

masjid

The article translates this as "place of worship". I think a more accurate translation is "Place of prostration". In Aramaic S-G-D means prostration, as it does in Arabic. There are however almost no sources about Beta Israel's masjid (there are obviously many about Islam's masjid (Mosque) which indeed means place of prostration (see Mosque) FergusArgyll (talk) 14:16, 1 September 2025 (UTC)

Removing nonsense

I deleted the paragraph below in its entirety. The reference in Josephus talks about Onias establishing a temple in Egypt, not large scale migration, and not to Kush. The reference to Philo seems wholly concocted - he does talk about a large population of Jews in Alexandria, and "not a few" in Libya, but he doesn't mention Cush/Kush.

"Early Jewish historian, Josephus wrote that the migration of 100,000 Jews to Kush occurred during the reign of Ptolemy I Soter, and pushed south crossing the Nile towards the Red Sea. Support for the large number of Jews who came to the region can be obtained from the words of the Philo, who says that at the time there were 1,000,000 Jews living in Egypt, Libya and Cush. Italian scholar Filosseno Luzzatto cites this in reference to the custom of offering sacrifices among Ethiopian Jews was influenced by the Land of Onias."

Joe in Australia (talk) 00:54, 3 December 2025 (UTC)

I deleted the paragraph below in its entirety. It is obvious nonsense: Mar Zutra lived in Babylonia, more than 300 years after the Destruction of the Temple. The purported reference seems to be to BT Kiddushin 22b, and Rashi does in fact identify "Hindua" (not "Hanuda") with "Cush" - but that's because Cush can also refer to an area of India, as in "Hindu Kush".

"During the Amoraim period the Babylonian Talmud mentions a man named Yehuda from Aksum in Hanuda (then Abyssinia) came to Jerusalem to visit the Temple." Joe in Australia (talk) 01:09, 3 December 2025 (UTC)

I had to delete this section again. I have multiple copies of the Talmud. I read Hebrew and Aramaic. The claim is wishful nonsense, based on a foolish misreading. Please don't restore it. Joe in Australia (talk) 02:12, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Here's a link to the alleged source in Josephus. As you can see, it does not support the claim. I have a degree in Jewish history and I am familiar with the source texts. Please do not revert this fanciful and ungrammatical claim again. Antiquities of the Jews, Book XIII, Chapter 3 Joe in Australia (talk) 02:19, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Accusaitons of ARBPIA violations and removal of scholarly content

User:Morta204 has been blatantly vandalizing Wikipedia thorough a non-neutral point of view by removing sourced content with outright false and misleading summaries. This seems to be a pattern that is apparently almost single one of his edits, especially on the article Beta Israel.

Let's first start with his mass reverts of the User:Shoshin000.

1. added Jewish Diaspora to related to groups which was removed by Shoshin based on the genetic studies and scholarly work on their ethnogenesis in the article without an edit summar
2. removed the fact that Beta Israel cluster "closely" with non-Jewish groups where they lived without an edit summary
3. removed the fact that the ethnogenesis of Beta Israel remains a matter of dispute from the lede with genetic studies cited and backed by Ethiopian Jewish history experts like Steven Kaplan with a rich debate in the "Scholarly views" section in the article at that point without an edit summary
4. non-notable revert which was redundant
5. changed Christian missionaries to Protestant proselytism without a cited source of edit summary

Let's see what Shoshin000 has to write after this:

He creates Talk:Beta_Israel#Why did you remove everything? and writes

@/Morta204

Could you kindly explain why you trashed my revision? Consider adding an edit summary next time. Shoshin000 (talk) 11:05, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

If you don't answer I will restore it and ask for this page to be protected. Shoshin000 (talk) 11:05, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

As other people are also editing this article, I've restored the former version; the more I would wait, the more people would have been bothered.

I am still ready to hear constructive criticism. Shoshin000 (talk) 08:32, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

Morta204 does not respond. I agree with Shoshin000 that this page (which has sensitive topics related to Israel and Jewish history) needs to be protected from new accounts with few edits like Morta who are clearly not here to build an encyclopedia. Shoshin000 maybe forgets about this after raising this on the talk page.

Let's move on to October 2025:

1. With the edit summary "added updated information and more citations", he once again removes sourced content about the controversial ethnogenesis of Beta Israel, the terminology of the term "Beta Israel" and removes the connection of the word "Zagwe" to the Agaw people
2. Makes a massive edit of 93k characters with the edit summary "Added and updated information up to date, fixed the religion section with citations and included more information . He adds a lot of content which I don't have the time to verify but he obviously vandalizes the article by nuking longstanding sourced sections "Calender and Holidays", "Languages", "Origins and traditions" and "Scholarly Views" on their ethnogenesis and origins which has been a long target of this vandalistic user. The scholarly views had various theories about the highly debated hypothesis of Beta Israel by experts such as Israel-American Steven Kaplan (Africanist) who also layed out the different schools of thought in that section. Also nuked the section about "The Falash Mura's difficulties in immigrating to Israel" and their conversion by Christian missionaries.
3. Again removes sourced historical content in without an edit summary and removed the History of Ethiopia and History of Eritrea templates
4. adds a few unsourced lines without an edit summary
5. Nukes the entire section without an edit summary on Genetic studies (-15k characters) since he does not like it. It's funny that he does not try this trick on main article which has similar content (Genetic studies on Jews) since multiple active and experienced editors there would see through this.
6. Cluebot rightly detects all of this as vandalism "16:10, 20 October 2025 ClueBot NG talk contribs m  127,460 bytes −75,693  Reverting possible vandalism by Morta204 to older version. Report False Positive? Thanks, ClueBot NG. (4436030) (Bot) undothank (Tags: Rollback Reverted)"
7. Morta204 reverts this by saying "fixed page"

User:Doug Weller reverts some of his additions by calling it non-RS and fringe unreliable sources. ([1] and [2])

After November 2025:

1. Adds some sourced content (that I haven't had the time to verify like his other additions) and some unsourced lines as well with the edit summary "Updated information, added primary sources, and fixed factual errors".
2. Makes a manual revert with the "m" tag
3. User:Joe_in_Australia disputed some of the content he added and creates a talk page discussionTalk:Beta_Israel#Removing_nonsense but as always Morta204 reverts his edits and doesn't engage in the talk page discussion. (1 and 2)
4. User:Zman19964 readds the genetics section.
5. Reverts common-sense copy edits by User:Pincrete and User:Eggsyntax without an edit summary. (1 and 2)
6. Makes a major edit in the lede with a dishonest "m" (minor tag) and no edit summary again
7. Reverts an edit by an IP who removed one of the claims he added by calling it "unsourced" with no edit summary.
8. Reverts a copyedit by Pincrete with no edit summary.
9. Removes content added by User:Bukboy35 with the minor tag and no edit summary.

In other tangentially related articles:

Removed a sourced line about Ethiopian Jews and Qemant people with the edit summary (minor tag) broken up the paragraphs to make them more readable in Habesha people article and in another edit on the same article removed sourced content about clothing with the edit summary "Added more pictures".

He also changed the term "Palestine" referring to the region in the source with "Ancient Israel" in Samaritans with the minor tag and no edit summary in his last edit.

All of this and the level of sophisticated and advanced level of vandalism and edits makes me believe that Morta204 (81 edits) is not actually a new editor and is in fact a sockpuppet so I researched which socks have last edited Beta Israel and found that there are two relevant ones - User:KybordK6K (57 edits) and User:Ezra Ben Yosef (There are 4 pages edited by both Yosef and Morta204 which makes up a large share of their total edit count) while KybordK6K only has Beta Israel page in common 2.

Both socks have multiple other sockpuppets on their investigation casepage . The parent sock of Ezra Ben Yosef i.e BasedHistorian PHD has also edited Habesha peoples which wasn't edited by Ben Yosef has been by Morta204 3 and not very surprisingly it was also about "adding pictures" like Morta204 did. (User contributions for BasedHistorian PHD)

Investigation page of BasedHistorian PHD. - In one of the remarks there, User:Liz wrote that "I guess we should keep a close eye on Beta Israel along with Sabean colonization of Africa for future sock activity."

Thank you. Theofunny (talk) 11:31, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

Pinging all editors mentioned here: @Morta204 @Shoshin000 @Doug Weller @Liz @Bukboy35 @Zman19964 @Pincrete @Eggsyntax @Joe in Australia Theofunny (talk) 11:35, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

@Theofunny's analysis seems reasonable to me. I thought about digging deeper after my edit was reverted by them, but since it was a one character edit, it didn't seem like a priority. Thanks for looking into it! eggsyntax (talk) 12:20, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

And I was mistaken that this article was covered under WP:ARBPIA which it is not as told to me by admin @The Bushranger when I requested page protection. Theofunny (talk) 11:39, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

I would like to respond to the concerns raised about my edits to the article on Beta Israel and address the specific points that have been brought up.

First, the repeated claim that I “nuked” large portions of sourced content is not accurate. The edits in question were part of a broader restructuring effort, where content was reorganized, expanded, and integrated into newly developed sections. I added and developed sections covering customs, religious practices, historical context, and scholarly perspectives, and redistributed material accordingly to improve coherence and avoid fragmentation. The intention was not removal, but reorganization and expansion.

Regarding the removal or restructuring of sections such as “Scholarly views,” “Origins and traditions,” “Languages,” and similar headings: these topics were not discarded. Instead, I aimed to incorporate scholarly perspectives throughout the article, so that academic viewpoints are presented in context rather than isolated. This approach reflects an effort to better align with neutrality and due weight by integrating multiple viewpoints across relevant sections.

On the genetics section specifically: if a large portion of that content was removed, that may have been unintentional during a major restructuring edit. It is important to note that if my intention had been to remove or suppress genetic evidence due to disagreement, I would have instead altered, challenged, or selectively edited that content. A full removal in the context of a large-scale edit is more consistent with an editing oversight than deliberate exclusion which was added back and not removed since it was.

Concerning the claim about changing “Christian missionaries” to “Protestant proselytism” without sourcing: this characterization overlooks that the topic is well-documented across the article and in the broader literature. Missionary activity directed toward the community included explicitly Protestant efforts, supported by historical sources such as the writings of Henry Aaron Stern and organizations like the London Society for Promoting Christianity Among the Jews, as well as German Protestant missions active in Ethiopia during the relevant period. My wording (“Protestant proselytism” and reference to Messianic Jewish and Protestant missionaries) reflects that specific historical context rather than being unsourced or speculative. If needed, I am open to ensuring that these references are explicitly cited at the exact point where the terminology is used.

With respect to the lead and content added by User:Shoshin000: some of the material appeared at or near the top of the article in a way that I did not consider appropriate for the lead section. My understanding is that the lead should summarize the article concisely, rather than include detailed or potentially undue content. My edits were intended to streamline the introduction and improve structure, not to dismiss sourced contributions.

Regarding terminology such as Zagwe and Agaw: these are distinct concepts in the scholarly literature. The Zagwe dynasty refers to a Christian ruling dynasty that governed parts of Ethiopia and Eritrea between approximately 1137 and 1270, whereas the Agaw people are an ethnic group. My edits aimed to avoid conflating these terms and to maintain historical and academic accuracy.

On the Falasha Mura immigration issue: this content was not removed. It was reorganized into its own dedicated section, allowing for clearer and more focused coverage rather than being embedded within unrelated parts of the article.

Regarding edit summaries: I acknowledge that some of my summaries were brief or missing, particularly during large edits. This was not intended to obscure changes, and I will make an effort to provide clearer summaries going forward, you have to take I had directly brought sources from primary and scholarly sources which included different languages including Arabic, Italian, French, Hebrew and German and from wikipedia version of the page from different languages.

On reverting to a previous version: restoring older revisions wholesale does not resolve the underlying concerns. It removes substantial scholarly and sourced content that I have added, including expanded sections and improvements to structure and coverage. This risks diminishing the article’s quality rather than addressing specific disputes, which would be better handled through discussion and incremental changes.

On ClueBot NG: the claim that it “reverted vandalism” is misleading. ClueBot is an automated tool that detects large-scale edits, not vandalism per se, and flags them for review. Being flagged by ClueBot does not mean the edits were malicious or unconstructive, and therefore the assertion that I committed vandalism based solely on ClueBot’s detection is unsubstantiated.

On engagement: I am willing to discuss specific concerns and work toward consensus. However, reverting substantial edits without addressing the underlying content issues does not facilitate collaborative improvement.

Finally, allegations of vandalism, sockpuppetry, or conduct violations (including references to Arbitration Committee/Palestine-Israel articles) are serious and should be supported by clear evidence. At present, these appear to be accusations assembled to support a broader claim that has not been substantiated. My edits have been made in good faith with the aim of improving the article’s clarity, structure, and comprehensiveness. I believe content disagreements should be resolved through discussion and consensus-building and not accusations.

I welcome detailed, section-by-section feedback so that we can collaboratively refine the article and reach a stable, well-sourced version.

Thank you. Morta204 (talk) 13:46, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

If you're the one responsible for the claims regarding Josephus and the Talmud then you ought to be ashamed of yourself. What nonsense. Please do not restore them. Joe in Australia (talk) 02:22, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

I am writing to follow up on the recent reversion and to request a more detailed and constructive discussion regarding the removal of content from the page.

First, I would like to emphasize the scale and effort behind the hundreds of high quality material that was removed. The edits in question were not minor additions; they represented many hours of careful, deliberate work. I spent a significant amount of time locating, reviewing, and synthesizing hundreds of high-quality scholarly and historical sources. These included academic publications, reputable historical analyses, and well-regarded secondary sources, all selected with the intention of strengthening the page’s accuracy, neutrality, and depth. The process involved not only gathering sources, but also integrating them thoughtfully into the structure of the page, rewriting sections, improving organization, and ensuring that the content was coherent and accessible.

The reversion effectively removed a substantial body of well-sourced material. Importantly, this was not limited to a small subset of potentially problematic edits; it included contributions from other editors before the page revision, which collectively helped to expand and refine the page. As a result, the page has been brought back to a version from almost a year ago, which has reduced the clarity, comprehensiveness, neutrality, and overall quality that had been developed.

I am also concerned by the edit summary referring to “massive ARBPIA violations and removal of scholarly content,”as well as the claim that the material consisted of “outright false and misleading summaries.” These are serious assertions, especially since the Israel-Palestine conflict was not mentioned once in the content in question, and I have not seen clear evidence or examples provided on this talk page showing how these violations occurred. In particular, the scholarly content had already been discussed and addressed and was supported by reliable academic sources. If there are still concerns, I would appreciate it if they could be set out clearly with concrete examples, so that they can be properly reviewed and addressed. Without that clarity, it is difficult to understand the basis for such broad and serious accusations.

Given the extent of this removal, I am seeking a clear and specific explanation for the characterization of these edits as “outright false and misleading summaries.” This is particularly important in light of the statement that you had not yet "had sufficient time to verify the material". If the content was not fully reviewed, it is difficult to understand the basis for such a definitive assessment. I would greatly appreciate it if specific examples or sections could be identified, along with an explanation of how they fail to meet the relevant standards. This would allow for a focused and productive discussion, rather than a broad and unsupported dismissal of a large body of work.

I want to stress that my intention throughout has been to improve the page in line with established quality standards. The edits were aimed at enhancing neutrality, expanding coverage, improving structure, and incorporating a broader range of scholarly perspectives. The goal was not to introduce bias or misleading summaries, but rather to build a more comprehensive and well-supported article.

I remain fully open to constructive feedback and collaboration. If there are specific concerns about sourcing, phrasing, balance, or interpretation, I am more than willing to revisit and revise the material accordingly. However, given the time and effort invested, as well as the number and quality of sources involved, I believe it is reasonable to expect detailed, evidence-based feedback to justify such a large-scale reversion.

Moving forward, I would welcome the opportunity to work together to restore and refine the content in a way that addresses any legitimate concerns while preserving the substantial scholarly value that was added. And a collaborative approach focused on identifying specific issues and resolving them would, in my view, be far more productive than broad removals without clear justification.

I would appreciate a timely response as other people are editing the article and as a lot of material and contributions of other editors have been removed as a result of these accusations.

Thank you. Morta204 (talk) 01:35, 8 April 2026 (UTC)

@Theofunny Since I have not received a response to my previous comment on the talk page, I wanted to inform you that I plan to proceed with revising the article. I understand that your concerns about “massive ARBPIA violations” and the “removal of scholarly content” were central to the reversion of my edits. However, I believe these concerns were not fully substantiated, as we both have not identified any ARBPIA violations in the article, and the scholarly consensus were to have been integrated appropriately to maintain both quality and neutrality.

While I respect your position, I believe it was not entirely justified to revert the page to an older version, especially when my edits included substantial updates, filled in missing sections, added new sections, and hundreds of new high-quality sources and material, along with valuable contributions from other editors.

That said, I have carefully considered your feedback, and I recognize that there are some valid points to address. To move forward constructively, I would propose the following:

1. Restoring the previously updated version of the article, prior to the reversion.
2. Adding a dedicated "Scholarly Views" section that includes the consensuses from both schools of thought, ensuring a balanced representation and neutrality from both sideds

Therefore, I believe this approach will improve the overall quality of the article while addressing the concerns raised in a fair and balanced manner. I look forward to your thoughts and hope we can collaborate to reach a consensus.

Thank you. Morta204 (talk) 23:49, 10 April 2026 (UTC)

I am current travelling for important work + am sick at the same time; I'll respond in a couple of days and even if cannot agree then we can take it to Dispute Resolution. I'll also be opening a SPI request at the sockpuppet investigation page, to confirm whether my allegations are right or not about the relation between Ezra Ben Yosef and your account. Sorry for the inconvenience. Theofunny (talk) 18:16, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for your message, I hope you recover quickly and that things ease up on your end soon.

I’m happy to pause substantive changes until you’re available to engage further. I also appreciate your note about responding in a few days.

That said, I think it would be most constructive to focus on the central issues you raised, namely the allegations of “massive ARBPIA violations” and the removal of scholarly content. From my perspective, these concerns were not clearly demonstrated with specific diffs or policy-based examples, and in their absence, I found the full reversion difficult to justify.

In particular, the reversion removed a substantial body of work, including hundreds of high-quality, well-sourced scholarly references and significant content improvements. I believe this material was added in line with neutrality and sourcing standards, so its entire removal without clearly identified issues warrants a more careful, evidence-based review. If this matter does proceed to dispute resolution, I think it will be important to closely examine these removals alongside the claims of “masive ARBPIA violations” and the alleged issues with scholarly content, to determine whether those claims are substantiated by specific diffs and policy-based justification.

I also want to reiterate that I still stand by my earlier proposal: restoring the updated version of the article and adding a dedicated “Scholarly Views” section to present the relevant perspectives in a balanced and structured way. I believe this would address the concerns raised while preserving valuable, well-sourced content.

Regarding the SPI, I understand your intention to pursue it and will cooperate fully with any review process through the appropriate channels.

I look forward to continuing this discussion when you’re available, and I’m very open to working through any specific concerns in a focused and constructive manner.

Thank you. Morta204 (talk) 21:48, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

Hi, so I was discharged from the hospital on Thursday after becoming more severely ill and being diagnosed with jaundice after my last comment. I'll be engaging in the discussion after a day or two. I've not been on Wikipedia or rather anything for many days. Theofunny (talk) 13:55, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

Hi, thank you for the update, and I’m really sorry to hear you’ve been unwell. I hope you’re recovering steadily and able to take the time you need. When you're ready to resume, I think it would be helpful to go through the specific concerns step by step, especially the points about ARBPIA and the content removals, so we can look at concrete diffs and policy-based reasoning together. I remain open to working collaboratively toward a resolution, including discussing possible structures like a dedicated section for scholarly views, if that helps address the issues raised. Morta204 (talk) 15:19, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

Hi, I hope you're continuing to recover. Given that more than a month has now passed since the initial discussion, and around two weeks since your last response, I’ve decided to move forward with my earlier proposal to restore the previously updated version of the article, including the scholarly views section that was removed in the reversion. I have tried to allow sufficient time for discussion before taking further action, but I also believe it is important that progress on improving the article not remain indefinitely stalled. That said, I remain fully open to discussing any specific concerns in detail, particularly the points regarding alleged ARBPIA violations and the removal of scholarly content, since those were the primary bases for the reversion. I also noticed that the same points was used to revert my other edits which have no connection with these policies such as my edit on the Zamzam Well. Although I am not too concerned on those edits as they're small scaled edits which are mainly grammatical fixes and link fixes. I think it would be most constructive to examine concrete diffs and policy-based reasoning step by step so that any disputed material can be evaluated carefully and fairly. I also remain open to collaborative solutions, including structural approaches such as a dedicated section for scholarly views, if that helps address concerns while preserving well-sourced material and maintaining neutrality. Morta204 (talk) 20:02, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

Just to clarify on the point, I made earlier I added the scholarly views section. Morta204 (talk) 20:08, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

I say it again

Add some kind of protection to this article, some folks remove sourced information, perhaps not in good faith. As this community nowadays mostly lives in Israel, there is a lot of touching with the ARBPIA cesspool. Shoshin000 (talk) 16:08, 1 June 2026 (UTC)