Resistance movement: what Wikipedia removed
This article defines “resistance movement,” the umbrella term Wikipedia applies to groups including Palestinian armed factions. Through 2020 the opening noted that “resistance movement” and “freedom fighters” “can become ambiguous terms for what other observers might describe as terrorists.” Today the opening defines the term without that qualifier, and terror appears zero times in the opening though it survives eight times in the article. A reader today learns only the definition of a resistance movement, and not that Wikipedia’s own opening once flagged the term as ambiguous with terrorism.
The word “terror” appeared 3 times in this article’s opening at its peak, in 2005. Today the opening carries none; the body carries 8. Checked against the full current article on 2026-08-01.
The tracked words, snapshot by snapshot
Section titled “The tracked words, snapshot by snapshot”| word | 2005 | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 | 6 October 2023 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| terror | 3 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| occupation | 2 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 2 |
| colonial | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| resistance | 12 | 7 | 14 | 12 | 9 | 9 |
Counts are of the opening paragraph only, the part most readers, search engines and AI training sets ever quote.
What was taken out
Section titled “What was taken out”- The definitional sentence describing a resistance movement as a group dedicated to fighting an invader, reworded in the current opening.
- A sentence broadening the term to any organized effort by supporters of a cause, dropped from the opening.
- A sentence on organizations and individuals critical of foreign intervention, dropped from the opening.
- The qualifier that the terms can be ambiguous with what other observers might describe as terrorists, dropped from the opening.
How it opened then, and now
Section titled “How it opened then, and now”2005 (revision 17752195):
A resistance movement is a group dedicated to fighting an invader in an occupied country. The term can also refer to any organized effort by supporters of a common goal against a constituted authority . Thus resistance movements can include any irregular armed force that rises up against an enforced or established authority, government , or administration . This frequently includes groups that consider themselves to be resisting tyranny . Some resistance movements are underground organizations engaged in a struggle for national liberation in a country under military occupation or totalitarian domination. The term resistance has political overtones, as people have used it (and historically, o…
2025 (revision 1297546448):
Organized effort to withstand a government or an occupying power ( Learn how and when to remove this message ) A resistance movement is an organized group of people that tries to resist or try to overthrow a government or an occupying power , causing disruption and unrest in civil order and stability. Such a movement may seek to achieve its goals through either the use of violent or nonviolent resistance (sometimes called civil resistance ), or the use of force, whether armed or unarmed. In many cases, as for example in the United States during the American Revolution , or in Norway in the Second World War , a resistance movement may employ both violent and non-violent methods, usually opera…
Related
Section titled “Related”- The drift report: what changed across all 61,944 watched articles
- The case file for this article, with every snapshot and every marked removal
- Who made the cuts: removals grouped by the account that made them
- The live article on Wikipedia
Wikipedia text is quoted under CC BY-SA 4.0. This page is not affiliated with Wikipedia.