Court tells Ma'ariv editor-in-chief to pay shekel's damages for slander

Ma'ariv editor-in-chief Amnon Dankner will pay one shekel in compensation to right-wing activist Itamar Ben-Gvir for slander, the Supreme Court ruled on Sunday.

The ruling ended a long-winding saga that began in October 1995, after Channel 1 television aired a program of the talk show Popolitica on which Dankner had called Ben-Gvir "a little Nazi." The show, that discussed the Right's protests against the peace process only two weeks before the assassination of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

In the course of the program, Dankner said "one is allowed to defend oneself from little Itamar, this Nazi," and also called out "shut your mouth, you dirty Nazi."

Ben-Gvir, who was an activist in the extremist right-wing Kach movement, filed a lawsuit for slander after the show was aired. To his defense, Dankner tried to prove to the Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court that he was speaking the truth, by showing the ideological resemblance between the Kach movement and Nazism.

The Magistrate's Court ruled in favor of Ben-Gvir and ordered Dankner to pay one shekel in damages for slander. Both parties then appealed to the Tel Aviv District Court, which overturned the ruling in favor of Dankner.

The Supreme Court was asked to rule on Ben-Gvir's appeal against the ruling of the District Court.

In a verdict that stretches 103 pages, the three-Justice panel was divided in their opinions. Justice Ayala Procaccia said she believes the appeal should be accepted and compensation of NIS 15,000 should be ruled in favor of Ben-Gvir.

Procaccia said she is of the opinion that "the when the expression little dirty Nazi is thrown in the face of a Jew, in a Hebraic country that is deeply affected by the living memory of the Holocaust, it is a radical offense by any standard, even in a polarized society, with an agressive discourse between rival ideological factions."

Justice Edna Arbel ruled the appeal should be accepted but the compensation of a single shekel should remain in place. Justice Eliezer Rivlin said that the appeal should be rejected altogether.

Justice Rivlin said "we must beware of gnawing away at the freedom of journalists and others to condemn ? even by using blunt and radical language ? those who bully and hold opinions that reek of racism."

"This the right - and obligation - of the members of a democratic society to denounce such behavior and such views. This is the other side of the coin of liberal freedom of speech, which includes also racist expressions," he said.

The Supreme Court panel decided that the original ruling of the Magistrate's Court should remain unaltered and that Dankner will be ordered to pay one shekel in compensation to Ben-Gvir.