Watchdog cancels rebuke of Haaretz, Gideon Levy over article attacking Border Police
Freedom of expression allows for publication of irritating views,’ rules Press Council court of appeal.
By Haaretz | Dec. 29, 2013 | 6:30 PM |
Haaretz journalist Gideon Levy did not break the code of professional ethics in an article that severely criticized the Border Police, the Israeli Press Council’s court of appeals ruled on Thursday. Freedom of expression, the court ruled, allows for “the publication of extreme, provocative and annoying views.”
The court accepted an appeal filed by Levy and Haaretz, thereby overturning a previous ruling by the ethics court, which reprimanded the two and ordered them to apologize for the article.
Levy’s article, headlined “The blurred line between hero and murderer” (May 23,) blamed a mass-shooting in a Be’er Sheva bank which claimed the lives of four people on the shooter’s service in the territories.
Shooter Itamar Alon’s murderous behavior may have been derived from lessons learned in the Border Police, Levy wrote, where Alon learned “not just how to use a weapon but to use it with ease. He also learned he can kill innocents without punishment.”
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Levy also wrote that “the Border Police is the sickest corps of the occupation administration. The reasons are sociological and ethnic and are linked to the background of most of its policemen ? Russians, Druze, Ethiopians and residents of Israel’s geographic periphery, who are cynically and, not coincidentally, sent by Israel to be the spearhead of its violent rule over the Palestinians and who, not coincidentally, become extremely brutal.”
Israel Police, of which the Border Police is a branch, filed a complaint with the council against Levy and Haaretz, accusing Levy of severe breach of ethics, misrepresenting facts and casting racist allegations against the Corps and its officers.
The council brought the complaint before the ethics court, which ruled in the plaintiff’s favor and ordered Haaretz to publish an apology formulated by the court.
But in its decision overturning the ruling, the court of appeals wrote that Levy’s article is “an opinion piece, which presents a possible thesis as to the reasons behind Alon’s murderous episode. Levy did not write an informative report or a journalistic investigation on Alon or on the Military Police.”
According to the court, “this is the expression of an opinion on a clear public and political issue, which enjoys the highest safeguards under the principle of freedom of expression.”
The court determined that Levy’s statement that Alon’s actions stemmed from his service with the Border Police is “undoubtedly a harsh, irritating and provocative statement, viewed as a determination of fact. Furthermore, this is a harsh indictment against the Border Police, where the statement alleges incidents of killing innocents occur without proper response.”
However, said the court, “this is clearly a case of the expression of a thesis, an opinion, by the writer. Harsh words, but ones which are allowed to be presented for debate in a free society.”
The court rejected the police’s claim that Levy made a racist allegation in linking between the Border Police being “the sickest corps of the occupation administration” and “the background of most of its policemen ? Russians, Druze, Ethiopians and residents of Israel’s geographic periphery.”
According to the court, though the statement was an “unnecessary generalization” it is still allowed under the principle of free expression.
In closing, the court wrote that though the article was indeed extreme, “freedom of the press in Israel can tolerate such criticism, especially when it is directed at a public, government, powerful body, which defends lives.”
