This piece was originally published in NPOV.

Wikipedia has imposed a site ban on Iskandar323, permanently removing one of the platform’s most influential editors. A site ban is Wikipedia’s most severe sanction, revoking editing access entirely and ending an editor’s participation across all articles and administrative processes.

In January, NPOV reported that Wikipedia’s Arbitration Committee (ArbCom), its top adjudicating body, had voted unanimously in favor of the ban. At the time, enforcement appeared imminent. Instead, the decision entered a period of uncertainty, as procedural challenges and internal disputes delayed implementation and raised questions about whether the ruling would ultimately be carried out.

Earlier this year, it was.

Iskandar323 had operated for years at the center of a coordinated network of editors —known as the “Gang of 40” — responsible for shaping over a million edits across articles related to Hamas, Iran, Zionism, and the broader Middle East conflict. The group enforced ideological alignment through edit disputes, administrator channels, and procedural pressure, while marginalizing dissenting sources and softening material unfavorable to Islamist actors.