Hi. I have done some research, combing through various OSM forums and basically, it comes down to the issue of translate vs transliterate. And I discovered that your philosophy is very much in line with another philosophy that I have now come to subscribe to: Write it in a way that if a foreigner from that language would say the name as written in the foreign language, a local resident would understand the name and where was meant. Or as you put it: "better reproduces the flavour of the original". Thank you for your input and I can now say that I agree with your change. Lastly, should "Nahal" be spelled "nahal" as you did, or spelled like the Americans would spell it: "Nachal"?  