Thanks. I suppose this means we new zone Asia/East_Jerusalem, since East Jerusalem is the largest city in the West Bank.

Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its capital The PA claims East Jerusalem as its capital This is a political issue, and unresolved, though at the current time no nation maintains any embassies in Jerusalem, though several have consular offices there. The following article is relevent http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positions_on_Jerusalem The UN has yet to make a formal decision, and the decision of the world's nations varies. I guess the solution is either to use both Israel and the PA's preferred capitals as the cities to specify (Jerusalem and East Jerusalem), or go with neither and use Tel Aviv and Nablus. On 2011-08-28 1:40, Ephraim Silverberg wrote:

On Sat, 27 Aug 2011, Paul Eggert wrote:

...

Thanks. I suppose this means we new zone Asia/East_Jerusalem, since East Jerusalem is the largest city in the West Bank.

There is no city "East Jerusalem" just like there is no city "West Jerusalem". 43% of the population of "East Jerusalem" are Jewish Israeli citizens who have no status nor citizenship rights under the Palestinian Authority. Both the Jewish and non-Jewish residents of "East Jerusalem" have the right to Israeli citizenship.

There _is_ a city "Jerusalem" which is the united capital of the State of Israel.

Any change of this status will be decided either by negotiation or by a _binding_ U.N. resolution.

The most populous city in the West Bank portion of the Palestinian Authority is Nablus.

[N.B. I know that I am opening a Pandora's Box by posting this message to the timezone list, but I could not let this pass without comment. However, since I respect the high level of professionalism of the timezone list and do not wish political arguments to overrun the list, anyone who wishes to discuss the point with me can do so over private e-mail as I will not followup further to the entire list.] _____________________________________ Ephraim Silverberg, CSE System Group, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. Phone/Fax number: +972-2-5494521

At 06:08 28-08-2011, David Patte wrote:

This is a political issue, and unresolved, though at the current time no nation maintains any embassies in Jerusalem, though several have consular offices there.

[snip]

The UN has yet to make a formal decision, and the decision of the world's nations varies.

The fact that the UN has not made a formal decision or that there is a political issue does not mean that the people in a location are not keeping track of time. The database represents the history of local time for many representative locations around the globe. Pick the name of a city in the region that the locals use. Regards, -sm

Jamie, We have them as separate countries, but observing the same Olson zone. Tonight I got Greece well-mapped with 80 cities. Many more countries to go. Regards, John --- On Sat, 8/27/11, Alexander Krivenyshev <worldtimezone@yahoo.com> wrote:

From: Alexander Krivenyshev <worldtimezone@yahoo.com> Subject: West Bank and the Gaza Strip will have different time zones To: tz@lecserver.nci.nih.gov Date: Saturday, August 27, 2011, 6:16 PM Steffen Thorsen <straen <at> thorsen.priv.no> writes:

...

Gaza and the West Bank did go back to standard time in

the beginning of

...

August, and will now enter daylight saving time again on 2011-08-30 00:00 (so two periods of DST in 2011). The pause was because of Ramadan.

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=416217 Additional info: http://www.timeanddate.com/news/time/palestine-dst-2011.html

Best regards, Steffen Thorsen - timeanddate.com

According to the article in The Jerusalem Post:

West Bank and the Gaza Strip will have different time zones.

“…Earlier this month, the Palestinian government in the West Bank decided to move to standard time for 30 days, during Ramadan. The Palestinians in the Gaza Strip accepted the change and also moved their clocks one hour back. The Hamas government said on Saturday that it won’t observe summertime after the Muslim feast of Id al-Fitr, which begins on Tuesday…”

Fatah-Hamas rift now ‘fixed in time’ http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=235650

or

http://www.worldtimezone.com/dst_news/dst_news_gazastrip05.html

Alexander Krivenyshev - World Time Zone http://www.worldtimezone.com

1. The "asia" file now shows the switch back to standard time as being at 2:00 on the first Friday in September. Is the 2:00 correct, or should it be midnight, or one minute after midnight, or something else? And is the date correct? (Are folks really restarting DST at the end of August and then returning to standard time on September 3?) 2. Is the zone name "Asia/West_Bank" acceptable? --ado -----Original Message----- From: Alexander Krivenyshev [mailto:worldtimezone@yahoo.com] Sent: Saturday, August 27, 2011 9:17 To: tz@lecserver.nci.nih.gov Subject: West Bank and the Gaza Strip will have different time zones Steffen Thorsen <straen <at> thorsen.priv.no> writes:

Gaza and the West Bank did go back to standard time in the beginning of August, and will now enter daylight saving time again on 2011-08-30 00:00 (so two periods of DST in 2011). The pause was because of Ramadan.

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=416217 Additional info: http://www.timeanddate.com/news/time/palestine-dst-2011.html

Best regards, Steffen Thorsen - timeanddate.com

According to the article in The Jerusalem Post: West Bank and the Gaza Strip will have different time zones. “…Earlier this month, the Palestinian government in the West Bank decided to move to standard time for 30 days, during Ramadan. The Palestinians in the Gaza Strip accepted the change and also moved their clocks one hour back. The Hamas government said on Saturday that it won’t observe summertime after the Muslim feast of Id al-Fitr, which begins on Tuesday…” Fatah-Hamas rift now ‘fixed in time’ http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=235650 or http://www.worldtimezone.com/dst_news/dst_news_gazastrip05.html Alexander Krivenyshev - World Time Zone http://www.worldtimezone.com

On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 16:47, Ilya Dogolazky <ilya.dogolazky@nokia.com>wrote:

(the question whether or not is "East Jerusalem" a location in above sense is not really relevant, because the city of Jerusalem is ruled by Israeli authorities (if someone likes it or not) and thus the Israeli time is used there)

Well said! This is the best reason to avoid Asia/E Jerusalem that I have seen so far. -- Sanjeev Gupta +65 98551208 http://www.linkedin.com/in/ghane

I still think its quite proper to use Jerusalem, and East_Jerusalem, as these are the chosen largest populated named plsces of the peoples involved. According to current UN mandates, Jerusalem is still considered an international city, not part of either Israel, or Palestine, which is consistant with the fact that no one has an embassy there. If the peoples involved do come to an understanding that is agreed by the UN, Jerusalem will be the capital of both Israel and Palestine, despite being in neither country. Stating East Jerusalem now simply reflects the current selection of both peoples. On 2011-09-05 12:49, John Hawkinson wrote:

Ilya Dogolazky<ilya.dogolazky@nokia.com> wrote on Mon, 5 Sep 2011 at 11:47:56 +0300 in<4E648CBC.2030809@nokia.com>:

...

West Bank is not a location: it's not a city name, it's not an island name. Is there any other name in the database using a territory name for LOCATION? If not, why to break this rule?

We have US/Eastern and friends, though it is via a link. The obvious answer to "why" is that it would be politically expedient and avoid a significant conflict; it would align the timezone rule with the political bodies defining them; and it would reduce overall confusion for neighboring localities.

I don't know if those are sufficient reason to deviate from Theory, but I have always felt that the Theory was problematic on this point. While we may manage the history of timezones based on the times in particular places, that is not how people think of their time zone. Unless you happen to live in one of the capital/populous cities we have designated, people think of their time zone as designated by their political authority. Having to pick a city that you know is not-where-you-are is always somewhat of a humbling exercise.

--jhawk@mit.edu John Hawkinson

Though the situation is not the same, parallels may be worth reviewing: - All of China officially uses one time zone, but last year there was a discussion about an ethnic group that uses a different time zone within China. What was decided on that issue? - If we where documenting the timezone of Paris in the early 1940s, would we use Berlin time?

On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 13:34, Paul Eggert <eggert@cs.ucla.edu> wrote:

It might be better to pick the most populous location in the West Bank where there is a reasonable working consensus about the time of day.

This is perhaps one of the best points in this thread. Regardless of what any previous "theory" recommendations would point to, the practical implications of defining a canonical location for a consistent set of time zone rules by using a city where the definition of "time of day" isn't even half as stable should be obvious. Not diminishing the merits of other cities suggested for this purpose, I think it's becoming clear that Hebron is the next most reasonable choice. On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 12:49, John Hawkinson <jhawk@mit.edu> wrote:

Unless you happen to live in one of the capital/populous cities we have designated, people think of their time zone as designated by their political authority. Having to pick a city that you know is not-where-you-are is always somewhat of a humbling exercise.

While this may perhaps be the case, the goal has been only to pick a reasonable location that is *representative* of each set of time zone rules. As the time in East Jerusalem, being split amongst official and nonofficial uses, is somewhat ill-defined, it is not a good candidate to fulfill this role. Rather, residents of East Jerusalem could decide to use Asia/Jerusalem or Asia/Hebron (or even Asia/Gaza) for their own purposes, depending on how their particular allegiances may lie. -- Tim Parenti

On 09/05/2011 03:12 PM, John Hawkinson wrote:

Indeed. My point was intended to suggest that names like Asia/Gaza and Asia/West_Bank are more desirable from a user standpoint, as well as avoiding some serious political problems.

The whole issue is so politically charged that there is no neutral term. Even if we were to use 'disputed territory', we'd simply get - from both sides of the conflict - the assertion, 'there's nothing to dispute; it's ours!' 'West Bank' is acceptable in English, but is politically loaded in Hebrew. The official name in Israel is [Ezor] Yehuda vShomron (Judaea and Samaria [Area]). (Left-wing newspapers do indeed use 'haGada haMaaravit', 'West Bank' or 'haShetahim', 'the Territories'.) Many Palestinians consider the use of any of the Hebrew names, even 'haShetahim', to be a rejection of their claim to the area. Given the ambiguities inherent in Asia/East_Jerusalem, Asia/Hebron seems like the best compromise. It's the largest city that unambiguously belongs to the territory in question. It also is a politically more-or-less neutral choice, unlike either East Jerusalem or Ramallah. (Sooner or later, it's near-certain that we'll get complaints that the choice wasn't Ramallah, just as we get recurring complaints that Asia/Shanghai wasn't Asia/Beijing. That's life.) Alternatively, we can throw up our hands, assert that the territory is disputed, and state that users should set their clocks to Jerusalem or Amman according to current local practice.