Australian Court Says Journalist Critical of Israel Was Wrongfully Fired
-
An Australian court ruled on Wednesday that the country’s main public broadcaster had illegally fired a journalist for reasons that included a social media post critical of Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip.
The journalist, Antoinette Lattouf, had sued the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, saying it had taken her off the air in December 2023 for expressing a political opinion. The ABC removed her after she made an Instagram post highlighting a Human Rights Watch report that accused Israel of “using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza.”
In her short time hosting the radio show “Sydney Mornings,” the ABC had received a barrage of complaints — which the judge described as an “orchestrated campaign” — urging it to take Ms. Lattouf off the air. They questioned her impartiality and accused her of being antisemitic, according to testimony in the case. “The consternation of senior managers of the ABC turned into what can be described as a state of panic,” the judge wrote in his decision.
Outside the court in Sydney on Wednesday, Ms. Lattouf said that the “unspeakable suffering” of children in Gaza was continuing, and that the judge’s ruling demonstrated that penalizing someone for speaking up about it was illegal. “I was punished for my political opinion,” she said.
