Talk:Qasem Soleimani/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

RfC: Should the article say Soleimani was "assassinated" or "killed"?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Should the article say Soleimani was "assassinated", or "killed"? (See previous section. Both terms are found in RS.) -sche (talk) 21:01, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated- Although there are some sources using the general term, i.e. 'killed', the actions leading to death of Soleimani was 'assassination' by definition. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary assassination is defined as "to murder (a usually prominent person) by sudden or secret attack often for political reasons" and Cambridge dictionary defines assassination as "the murder of someone famous or important." So when the reliable sources say he was assassinated, and he was actually assassinated (on the order of U.S. president) according to the definitions from dictionary, the proper word describing the action would be 'assassinated'. --Mhhossein ^talk 21:20, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Assassination is a murder of prominent person enjoying leadership status thus assassination should be used instead of word killing. Nannadeem (talk) 21:49, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed - the Cambridge definition quoted above says that this is used for the "murder" of somebody famous or important. Murder is a highly charged word and it implies that the action is wrong, so in my view would contravene WP:NPOV. Killed is neutral and factual. Per my comments above, I would not contest adding wording to the effect of stating some commentators had called it an assassination. Darren-M talk 21:50, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Killing may be unidentified too, whereas assassination is always an open secret. Nannadeem

(talk) 22:01, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

• • • Apologies @Nannadeem:, I don't understand your comment. Could you rephrase please? Best, Darren-M talk 22:05, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Word Assassination is used for killing in which one is killed due to his/her title or role. Basically all assassinations are killing but each and every killings do not involve politics or portfolio. We generally hear or read that someone was killed in a road accident by an unidentified vehicle (driver). Appropriately we will not use word murder or assassination because of words specific application. Conveniently, in assassination we have info about the killed and killer (both human beings). You may also see Assassination. Per International law norms this killing should be termed as assassination. Nannadeem (talk) 07:10, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
  • If, say, Iran lured the U.S. Secretary of the Army to Iraq as part of a peace negotiation, and there the SoA were killed by an Iranian drone, no one would hesitate to call it an assassination ... and it clearly is one under international law. To replace "assassination" with "killing" just because the party that did the killing has an interest in avoiding any charge of illegality is to inject POV. -- Jibal (talk) 06:29, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment / Note to admin or mod: This argument can almost certainly be dismissed, but if it is not dismissed, it will create a ton of work. If we're going to object to the use of 'assassination' and 'murder' on the grounds that they can never be neutral terms, then both words need to be removed from Wikipedia entirely. Selectively removing these words from articles about people killed by the US government but keeping them everywhere else would be a rather extreme bias. For the mod/admin who makes the final decision, please cite if you're basing your decision off of this argument or not. If so, we would need to change 60,898 articles with the words 'assassination' or 'assassinated', and 187,517 articles with the words 'murder.' -NorsemanII (talk) 11:08, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Killed. I came here from the RfC notice. I think the reality is that both words are accurate, and I see nothing wrong with using "killed" most of the time, but also referring to assassination at some places on the page. In a way, I think the sources are saying, above all, that it was a "targeted killing". Given that both words are widely used in sources, it's not really going to resolve the question to simply count how many sources use what. But I think that defaulting to calling it an assassination carries a subtle WP:POV that the US acted wrongly, whereas "killed" is a less loaded term. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:13, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • If assassinated is intrinsically linked with a subtle POV, then are you suggesting the word should be excised from Wikipedia, and certainly from article titles? We still have "subtle POV" Assassination of John F. Kennedy, Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., and many others. Or, perhaps you mean that people whom we appreciare get assassinated, people whom we don't like get killed so as to avoid a POV? — kashmīrī ^TALK 05:07, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
    • I'm certainly not suggesting that it should be generally excised (and I even said both could be used here). I realize that this is splitting hairs, but in an assassination, one generally expects that there is an identifiable assassin, whereas killing is a more generic term. I do realize of course that one also associates a killer with a killing, but it can equally be a killer or multiple killers. If there were a team of assassins, one would generally specify that. But as I said, I realize that this is splitting hairs. Where you ask about people we like and people we don't like, well, maybe there's a bit of that too. Nothing I would be proud of, but I think it's a fact that readers will tend to read it that way, and thus, a subtle POV. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:26, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
      • He was assassinated by a drone. There's nothing in the meaning of assassination (check the dictionary or the Wikipedia page) that entails the general expectations you assert. As for subtle POV, that's exactly what avoiding the word is. -- Jibal (talk) 06:16, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment: See my comment above. If we're objecting on the grounds that 'assassination' inherently carries a bias, we'll need to edit over 60,000 other Wikipedia pages. I hope we're not using this argument, but if we do, it's going to create a ton of work. -NorsemanII (talk) 11:13, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Killed My thinking is that in the article itself, "killed" should generally be used, since it's more neutral and more commonly used by the media. But I would also include a note or two, maybe with some quotes, on the usage of "assassination" by the media and others. Qono (talk) 22:18, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Changing my vote to both. Though "killing" was predominant early on, I'm seeing more and more reliable sources refer to this as an "assassination", and so both should be used. Qono (talk) 16:05, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Comment There was a very similar discussion on the talk page for the article about the attack regarding the title. The consensus was that, at least for the title, "assassination" was not appropriate. Qono (talk) 22:18, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated Was he not? Killed is much more vague.HAL333 22:19, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated because he was pretty important.--The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 01:04, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed We generally reserve the word "assassinated" for one-on-one, in-person killings. In the case of people killed by military action we tend not to call it "assassination", especially when additional people were killed as well as the target. See Death of Osama bin Laden for example. -- MelanieN (talk) 04:02, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Use both as required, do not shy away from assassinated since the vast majority of RSs use the word without hesitation. — kashmīrī ^TALK 04:49, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
  • According to AP Iran intends to approach UNSC to condemn the killing of Qassem Soleimani making it an international issue with legal prospective. Basically it is a killing by order of the head of state against a high official of other state. Hence assassination should be used per definition of specific cause to cover the practice in vogue. Nannadeem (talk) 07:54, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Both per Kashmiri's statement. As for the lead section, I believe killed is more appropriate, as it gives enough context without being overly specific. KyleJoan^talk 08:03, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
  • In this case (to apply killing and assassination) it is suggested that the tittle of page be “Assassination of Qasem Soleimani” and word killing should remain in text of the page. Nannadeem (talk) 08:21, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
    • This would conflict with the results of the RfC on the main event article page: Talk:2020 Baghdad International Airport airstrike#Correct Article Title?. Darren-M talk 09:46, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed Per reasons given by MelanieN. Given the fact that RS are covering both sides of the argument ("what Iran is calling the 'Ghassem Soleimani assassination,'[...] Officials pushed back against calling Soleimani's death an 'assassination.' One official said,'It's not an assassination.'") I think it is appropriate to include the fact that there is controversy, but I think "killed" is the most neutral way to describe it in Wikipedia's voice without taking a side between "assassinated" and "justifiable action taken in self-defense" AmbivalentUnequivocality (talk) 09:51, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated As a result of "an act of terror" which used by more RSes, the assassination happens. In addition some RSes suppurt it including 1,2,3, 4, 5, 6.--Saff V. (talk) 10:54, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated Accurately describes the manner of the killing, and being used by many sources including BBC, Forbes, CNBC and more. FrankP (talk) 13:22, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed, Killed is a general word used by all media. Assassinated would violate WP:NPOV. Alex-h (talk) 17:00, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated per what most sources use. Also per definition this was an assassination.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 17:59, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

"[T]he targeted killing of a high Iranian state and military official by a surprise attack was “clearly an assassination,” said Mary Ellen O’Connell, an expert in international law and the laws of war at the University of Notre Dame School of Law."

[1]--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 13:11, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Let's apply a little critical thinking to Mary Ellen O'Connell's views. She maintains that after Bashar al-Assad attacked his own people with chemical weapons on multiple occasions, an operation intended to diminish his ability to mount another such attack was "as serious as the triggering offense." Such a person has no credibility.

The article that deemed her an "expert" on the laws of war contradicts itself. Later in that same article, it says if Soleimani "was leading forces against the United States " – which indeed he was, having ordered multiple attacks against U.S. servicemembers and U.S. civilians – "under the international laws of war as enunciated in the 1949 Geneva Conventions, he and his forces could be considered legitimate battle targets during any actual war or armed conflict, declared or undeclared." And a strike on a "legitimate battle target" is the opposite of an assassination. RealisticPacifist (talk) 20:10, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

[2] tells me she is indeed well qualified and an expert in her area; one can of course bring opposing RS to the discussion.Selfstudier (talk) 09:57, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

Wow, O'Connell's supporters continue to show a severe shortage of critical thinking skills. The source that you cited is a post on the Blog of the EJIL, and group blogs are "generally unacceptable" as Wikipedia sources. That blog post is quite informative about O'Connell herself, however. A quick look at it found no fewer than seven things that detract from O'Connell's credibility even further:

1. O'Connell wrote that there were 63 "drone attacks against Somalia in 2019". Wrong: they weren't "against Somalia," they were against al-Shabaab terrorists, who are fighting to collapse the benevolent, internationally-recognized government of Somalia. (Are you aware that when al-Shabaab killed 537 bystanders on 14 October 2017, it was the fifth-deadliest terrorist attack in history?) The vast majority of Somali citizens, who aren't extremists, support these efforts to keep al-Shabaab in check. O'Connell's obfuscation of who exactly the drones were targeting is nefarious.
2. O'Connell is incredulous that "reporters have actually been asking about the legality of the killing." This is as far from a neutral point of view as one can imagine. She seems to have forgotten everything she ever learned about the laws of war as articulated in the Geneva Conventions, which clearly provide the answer: military commanders who have been engaged in hostilities – such as ordering hundreds of rockets to be launched against U.S. servicemembers and U.S. civilians in November-December 2019, to name only some of Soleimani's recent aggressions – are legitimate military targets.
3. She writes that a "defensive military response... must aim at the state legally responsible for the attack." She fails to acknowledge that the strike on Soleimani went above and beyond that requirement, because it was much more narrowly focused than some generic response against the state that had attacked U.S. servicemembers and U.S. civilians.
4. O'Connell disingenuously writes that "it is inconsistent with self-defense to single out one military commander" – as if she would have preferred that a randomly-chosen member of the Iranian military had been targeted, rather than the specific individual who had recently ordered many attacks against U.S. servicemembers and U.S. civilians.
5. She writes that military force must not be used to prevent an imminent attack. How hypocritical. Certainly if her home were invaded, and she had an opportunity to use force to prevent an imminent attack on herself or her family, she would not hesitate to do so.
6. She writes that "if the United States has intelligence that Soleimani was plotting attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq, the appropriate response was to take the information to Iraqi authorities." How naive; in other words, she thinks it's a good idea to count on the people who admired Soleimani so much that they attended his funeral to foil Soleimani's plots.
7. O'Connell complains that Iran has been "set back even further from its urgent goal of economic prosperity." That is the effect of all economic sanctions – so apparently, she wants all economic sanctions to be lifted, even those imposed on the world's #1 state sponsor of terrorism. RealisticPacifist (talk) 19:41, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated as his death fits the definition at Assassination - "Assassination is the act of killing a prominent person for either political, religious, or monetary reasons." Clearly, he was a prominent person and was killed for political reasons. Axedel (talk) 19:40, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Do you think Trump did it out of political interest? That's questionable - this seems to hurt his re-election to me. State Department and other major media sources says it was pre-emptive self defense, and from what we know of Soleimani's history of activities in the region, that makes a lot of sense. Danski14^(talk) 14:19, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps we should be wary of using Wikipedia articles for definitions. The very next sentence in that article sets out different criteria - "An assassination may be prompted by religious, political or military motives." Military reasons, seems to fit. FrankP (talk) 18:39, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated The term has been extensively used by various reliable media, and in terms of jargon and definition, I consider using it proper. Pahlevun (talk) 08:47, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
• killed From NPR: [3] State department officials say there is overwhelming evidence he was plotting an attack on US assets. "The official added that the administration also explored whether there was another way to stop Soleimani, such as having him arrested, and determined there was "no way."" Danski14^(talk)
  • Yeah, NPR [4]. Given all the controversies related to NPR's choice of wording, perhaps Wikipedia should not rely on their "guidance". — kashmīrī ^TALK 16:10, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
    • More importantly, whether Soleimani was plotting something or another is irrelevant, as is whether the admin discussed alternatives to assassinating him. -- Jibal (talk) 06:07, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated. Widely-used in reliable sources and expresses events more clearly. While 'killed' is used as well and could be used in the article, it's euphemistic in context and makes it harder to articulate the intentionality of the killing (which is unambiguous and not under dispute); given that both are well-sourced and used by high-quality sources, we should go with the more clear option. The argument some people are making that "assassinated" could have POV or TONE issues doesn't hold water when so many high-quality sources are using it, and if we're going to disregard the heavy use of both terms, the euphemistic nature of "killed" introduces WP:POV and WP:TONE issues of its own. I strenuously disagree with the implicit presumption that more euphemistic terms are always less POV or more neutral - sometimes (as in this case), precision and clarity are more neutral than couching things in euphemisms, at least when choosing between two terms that are both widely-used in high quality sources. In that respect this is a WP:NOTCENSORED situation; a widely-used, precise, and accurate term cannot be excluded simply because some people might find it offensive. --Aquillion (talk) 22:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

---

 Administrator note first, let me acknowledge that I am the admin who made the conscious decision to go with the alternate blurb, which used "killed" instead of "assassinate" on ITN. That said, participants should note that in the case of a no consensus result, "assassinate" will be prohibited from being added, per WP:ONUS. But those who express the preference for both, can obviously be included in the "assassinate" rather than the "killed" (per se.) camp. El_C 10:35, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

• Comment Don't try to play the system. The term assassinate was already there in the article before this RfC was started, only not in the lead section, so you will first need a consensus if you want to remove the word. Otherwise the terms stays and can be used as needed. — kashmīrī ^TALK 23:17, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
• Yes, given that both terms have been in use both in RS (widely) and in this article, to say that only one requires consensus to continue being used while the other does not—that in the absence of consensus for either, one will be prohibited and removed while the other will be required—is...certainly one point of view... -sche (talk) 23:35, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

• I stand corrected. El_C 23:37, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

• Since assassinated was there before the RfC, why is there editors changing it to death?--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 19:54, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

---

• Killed Yesterday, many news outlets were avoiding the term "assassinate" because there is some debate about whether it was an assassination. It is a really gray area and opinions are in flux. Wiki guidelines state we used avoid the use of terms that are contentious. Just because the term was there before, is irrelevant and bringing it up is not playing the system, it is observing the guidelines. Whether it was a killing or an assassination is currently being debated on the World platform. While I think this will eventually be viewed as an assassination, I would suggest the article states "killed" for the present time. People should not be pointing at Wiki and using it as proof of condemnation. If there are any moves by World Organizations like the United Nations to condemn the act as an "assassination", the article can be updated later. I agree with MZMcBride that the debate itself may be worthy of mention. Vampire77

At this point, given articles such as <https://apnews.com/1f914021bc802931059746a5ce8a192e>, the discussion about whether to call this an assassination almost seems noteworthy to mention itself in the article. --MZMcBride (talk) 06:20, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated - Per WP:PRECISE; there's a good reason mainstream sources use both words. All assassination is killing, but not all killing is assassination. Saying someone who has been assassinated has been killed is true. Saying someone who has been assassinated has been killed, is more precise. That said, the article should use the word assassinated exclusively. We don't have to belabor the point. NickCT (talk) 04:23, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated at least some of the time: the term is widely used in reliable sources (e.g. BBC, NYT), including in those (cited in the preceding section) which also use the more general term "killed" e.g. for brevity in their headlines. I think we could follow the RS in using the precise term some of the time and then, if making repeated reference to his unalivening, sometimes also using "killed". Where do our policies and guidelines guide us here? The policy to use WP:PRECISE language, invoked in the comment above mine, is technically in a policy about article titles, not article-body text like is under discussion here (though one might find its spirit good to follow). In turn, WP:NPOV urges us to represent the views of reliable sources on a topic, and RS widely use the term "assassinated", as well as the term killed, so the suggestion some other commenters make above—that the policy forbids only one of those words—seems to selectively misunderstand the policy: it, and our general tendency to follow RS, would seem rather to lead us to use both words. -sche (talk) 05:50, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated -- It was, by definition, an assassination ("murder (an important person) in a surprise attack for political or religious reasons"). Avoiding the correct word injects POV. Simply searching for "assassination" in google at this time brings up a string of articles in reliable sources referencing Soleimani. -- Jibal (talk) 05:55, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Both and the term death for the relevant subheader - @-sche: Why would you ask this and why would you even pick a side when you already said in the RFC blurb that both terms are found in RS? Flaughtin (talk) 10:54, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

  Why would I ask? Because it was requested in the section above this one (which I referenced in my initial comment) that there be an RFC on this, and the comments here bear out that there are people who do not take the view that I (as noted in my comment above) and you do, that "both terms are found in RS" means "both terms can be found in the article". -sche (talk) 20:59, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated Majority of RS goes with this.Selfstudier (talk) 11:35, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Killed per WP:LABEL. "Assassinated" is obviously a controversial label. Adoring nanny (talk) 11:49, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated Most sources are describing the "killing" as an assassination. We should recognize that and use "Assassination" for the section heading and use the word "assassinated" throughout the article. "Killed" is a more general term but "assassinated" is reserved for targeted killings of high profile officials of a nation and Soleimani was considered second highest official of Iran thus his killing fits the definition of "assassination". According to some sources he was on official business as part of a peace mission delivering a message from Khamenei to Iraqi prime minister for Saudis as part of larger negotiations between the arch rivals. Getting killed like that when being on official business in another country fits the bill for the term "assassination". I am also in favor of using the term "assassination" and "assassinated" until this RFC is decided as this term was used first and there was no consensus to remove it. We can change it to "Death" or "Killed" if this RFC decides so at the end. Sheriff | ☎ 911 | 13:02, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

I think it is worth pointing out that that is not true. It was first described as "killed", per this edit https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Qasem_Soleimani&diff=933788415&oldid=933788253, and the text used the terminology "killed" until (afaict) this edit https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Qasem_Soleimani&diff=934420027&oldid=934415867 two days after the RFC began (when there was no consensus to add it). Considering that fact, it the article should almost certainly use "killed" until there is consensus to change that. AmbivalentUnequivocality (talk) 01:40, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

• Killed as the word "assassinated" usually denotes killing of a non-military target, while at least according to one party he was a legal military target (a commander of a specific unit) and we should take that into account to not contravene WP:NPOV. H2ppyme (talk) 16:49, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed We typically have a "Death" section in bios and leave the description of method to for the contents. It seems like most arguments on WP are about gratuitous characterizations like this. He was inarguably "killed." Why not simply describe how he was killed and by whom, and let the reader decide how to characterize it beyond that? The purpose of WP is to educate, but too many people want to use it to indoctrinate.John2510 (talk) 18:09, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated wikipedia says "Assassination is the act of killing a prominent person for either political, religious, or monetary reasons. An assassination may be prompted by religious, political or military motives." sources: The EconomistThe Guardian The Newyork TimesAljazeera Rasulnrasul (talk) 18:36, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

References

• Killed This was a military strike against a military target. Blaylockjam10 (talk) 19:03, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated. It was a classic targeted assassination. That military means were employed is irrelevant. The target was not a 'military target'. The military were acting under a political order. Nishidani (talk) 19:07, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

That doesn't seem to make any sense. A serving army officer is a military target. And the military always act under "political orders". FrankP (talk) 20:18, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated It is what most of the reliable sources are saying, so is what we should say. AIRcorn (talk) 21:45, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated It's the word found in most reliable sources.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 23:55, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed As others above have mentioned, assassination tends to refer to non-military personnel/targets in a non-military capacity. Killing is more general and therefore a better option, especially since (as can be seen in this RFC) there's dispute over the terminology. Edit5001 (talk) 00:29, 8 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated as it is WP:PRECISE and it's widely used by the sources. --Cold Season (talk) 19:32, 8 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated I don't know why this is even an issue. Three of the four references used in the first mention of his death in the article use the term,and the only one that doesn't is an opinion piece defending the action. Tom Reedy (talk) 23:02, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Those references were added when someone changed the status quo wording to wording that used the word “assassinated”. The “assassinated” wording was reverted, but the references were kept. It’d be easy to find & add 2 references that use the word “killed”, but what’s important is how many sources use “killed” & how many sources use “assassinated”. Blaylockjam10 (talk) 19:41, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated. It is a shame that after so much consent, somebody still reverts this to "killed". It was pre-planned, pre-meditated murder, on alien territory, without possible and required approval of Congress, UNO, Iraqi government, against US law, UN Charta, Iraqui sovereignity, even against common sense, so far without even the evidence for the claimed motives. Most reliable expert sources within the USA and even more outside, see it exactly as what it is. Almost the only ones questioning this are partisans of the President. --Gabel1960 (talk) 05:53, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
• Context specific I think Flaughtin and Kashmiri make the strongest argument here, particularly with regard to the former's suggested phrasing of the section header. I think both terms can be used, depending on the context of the surrounding verbiage. So, my support is not for either "killed" or "assassinated," but rather, it depends on the context of the words surrounding it, and I'm not prepared to grant support to a blanket RfC that only one word may be used in the entire article. If the nom wants to initiate a new RfC that is more context specific and focused on a particular paragraph(s), then that's a good solution and I would consider supporting either "killed" or "assassinated" on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis. I also think one or more reference(s) to WP:PRECISE may be a red herring here, but, nevertheless, that policy cannot trump WP:NPOV. --Doug Mehus T·C 16:31, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated It's being used by reliable sources and killed is less precise. Dartslilly (talk) 18:44, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
• Killed is the proper use here. Many acts during wartime (weather cold or hot) are pre-planned, pre-meditated, military actions conducted in secret, and totally legal under the War Powers Act afforded the president of the U.S. by congress. Just as many RS references could be found using "killed" as any other, including "assassination". You can argue semantics, but the end result is he was unarguably "killed". GenQuest ^{"Talk to Me"} 21:47, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

The UK SOE assassinated a lot of Nazis in the Second World War. They were proudly assassinating them using specialist weapons like Welrod that had no other purpose.RonaldDuncan (talk) 12:31, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

• The US was not in a state of war with Iran as the UK and Germany during WW2. That makes an important difference. Soldiers get killed on the battlefield in a war. Political leaders in peacetime get assassinated. — kashmīrī ^TALK 10:42, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

• Assassinated is the proper term for such a targeted political killing of this nature. Hawkeye7 (discuss)
• Assassinated is the proper term for the targeted killing of a political rival, approved by a nation state. RonaldDuncan (talk) 12:31, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
• Assassinated To remove it, an action that was identified as such worldwide, would be NPOV. "Killed" can be used as well, but it is substantially less descriptive and informative than the actual circumstance. Wikipedia is not censored, and to erase the commonly used term for what clearly happened would in fact be just that. Three drones fired missiles in the assassination. I just Googled "Solemaini" and "assassinated" and got 50 million hits. He wasn't the only one killed: "Iranian and Iraqi officials have so far confirmed the U.S. attack killed eight other people who were accompanying Soleimani at Iraqi’s Baghdad airport.' https://www.voanews.com/extremism-watch/look-key-figures-killed-qassem-soleimani-us-strike They were: Jamal Jaafar Ibrahimi, more commonly known by his nom de guerre, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was the head of Iraq’s powerful anti-American Shiite group, Kataeb Hezbollah, and the deputy commander of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces. The U.S. labeled al-Muhandis an adviser to Soleimani and a key Shiite militia leader targeting the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq and U.S. allies in the Middle East. He reportedly participated in the bombing of Western embassies in Kuwait and the attempted assassination of the emir of Kuwait in the early 1980s. Before his death in the U.S. airstrike, al-Muhandis earlier this week was seen leading hundreds of Shiite protesters and militiamen who attacked the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad. Major General Hossein Pourjafari, also referred to as Jafari Nia in Iran, was known as the right-hand man of Soleimani since the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s and was his most trusted assistant afterward. He played a critical role in the formation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) intelligence wing. IRGC was designated a terror group by the Trump administration in April 2018 for its destabilizing efforts in the Middle East. Colonel Shahroud Mozaffari Nia served as a in the IRGC. Another Iran-Iraq War veteran, he spent his last years as a member of IRGC’s intelligence unit. He reportedly worked with pro-Iranian militias in Lebanon and Syria under the pseudonym of Abu Ahmad. Hadi Taremi, an IRGC lieutenant, was was a member of the IRGC security bureau for almost 10 years before his promotion to IRGC’s Quds Force unit. He was known to be one of the closest people in Soleimani’s inner circle and his No. 1 bodyguard. He accompanied Soleimani in most of his official visits inside Iran. Vahid Zamanian, another IRGC lieutenant was reportedly one of the rotating bodyguards of Soleimani and accompanied him in some unofficial international visits. Additionally, he reportedly was involved in the IRGC-Quds Force’s Fatemiyoun Brigade, an all-Afghan militia formed in 2014 and sent to Syria to help the government of Bashar al-Assad in the fight against Sunni rebels. Muhammad Radha al-Jabri was in charge of airport protocol for the Iraqi Shiite militia known as the Popular Mobilization Forces. Not much is known about al-Jabri’s background, but according to Iraqi media, he was a graduate of Imam Hossein University in Tehran. Hassan Abdu al-Hadi, Muhammad al-Shaybani and Haider Ali had not been identified as to their positions as of January 3rd. Activist (talk) 14:16, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Looks like there's a consensus to use "assassination," by a count of 26-13 or so. Activist (talk) 14:21, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

• Killed.

Dear Activist: most people believe the international laws of war, as enunciated in the 1949 Geneva Conventions, are a good thing, because they have made warfare somewhat less brutal. E.g., the Geneva Conventions encourage combatants to use tactics that minimize civilian casualties, and they have reduced the incidence of rape as a tool of war. Do you agree that the Geneva Conventions have been a good thing?

Soleimani had ordered attacks against U.S. servicemembers and against U.S. civilians. Therefore, according the the Geneva Conventions, he and his subordinates were legitimate military targets – and a strike on a legitimate military target is the the opposite of an assassination. Case closed.

This supposed "consensus" has largely appeared because – in a transparent imposition of their own non-neutral point of view – some news organizations have mischaracterized the strike as an assassination. Wikipedia is not a place to amplify the mischaracterizations of other organizations. RealisticPacifist (talk) 19:40, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.