C5. Section 15(10) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law - Publication after Publication
- Section 15(10) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law states:
"In a trial [...] civil defamation would be a good defense if [...] the defendant made the publication in good faith in one of the following circumstances:
[...]
The publication was made only to condemn or deny the defamation that had been published earlier;"
- The mention of this defense argument in the statement of defense is only in one line and the argument was not detailed in the summaries (except for the reference to the section). Therefore, it should be viewed as a claim that was abandoned.
C6. The relationship between the plaintiff and Channel 14:
- Until now, the discussion dealt with the relationship between the plaintiff and the defendant. Now, I have consolidated a number of paragraphs into the relationship between the plaintiff and Channel 14, which the parties rarely argue in context. The relevant legal framework for the aforementioned discussion is sections 11(a) and 15(12) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law.
Section 11(a) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law states:
"If defamation has been published in the media, they will be held criminally and civilly liable for defamation, the person who brought the defamation to the media and thereby caused its publication, the editor of the media and the person who actually decided on the publication, and the person responsible for the media will also be held in civil liability."
Section 15(12) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law states:
"In a trial [...] civil defamation would be a good defense if [...] the defendant made the publication in good faith in one of the following circumstances:
[...]
The publication was made on a radio or television broadcast that was not recorded in advance [...] The defendant is the person responsible under section 11 and he did not know and could not have known about the intention to publish defamation."
- The plaintiff claimed that Channel 14 was supposed to supervise and be responsible for the content on the channel, and therefore it was directly and indirectly responsible for everything stated therein; that the channel was negligent in its duties; that it did not make a public and clear correction. Therefore, it is liable under section 11(a) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law.
On the other hand, the defendants argued that Channel 14 is protected by section 15(12) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law, because the remarks were made on live broadcast and because Channel 14 did not know and could not have known in advance that the defendant would say the things that are the subject of the dispute.
- I have taken the position of counsel for the defendants in this context.
Since there is no dispute that the defendant's remarks about the plaintiff were said live; since there is no evidence before me that Channel 14 (or a party acting on its behalf) was aware of the things that the defendant was going to publish about the plaintiff's military service (as opposed to criticism of the plaintiff's opinions in the substantive dispute that was presented in a video clip from Channel 12, about which it can be assumed that the channel knew that there would be a response from the defendant), I find it difficult to see how it is possible to impose liability on Channel 14 as the media by virtue of the aforementioned section 11(a).
- In any event, the declarants were also not interrogated in this context (inter alia, based on a review of the pleadings from which it appears that the dispute between the plaintiff and Channel 14 is seen as superfluous to the dispute between the plaintiff and the defendant).
- If so, my conclusion is that Channel 14 has the protection of the aforementioned section 15(12) in the sense that it did not know and could not have known about the publication; In the circumstances described of not knowing in advance of the defendant's words, it is also not possible to attribute a lack of good faith to Channel 14 as a 'means of communication'. Therefore, the claim against Channel 14 should be dismissed.
Stage 4 - Compensation:
- The fourth stage in the hearing of the tort of defamation is the stage of compensation (see the Schocken Network).
- The law and case law outline considerations for determining the amount of compensation; the case law dealing with compensation without proof of damage in defamation law, recognition of pharmacological purposes, punitive, and educational-deterrence (for an analysis of the purposes, see Civil Appeal 89/04 Nudelman v. Sharansky (August 4,2008) and the long and varied list of considerations for awarding compensation without proof of damage. See, inter alia, Civil Appeal 7426/14 Anonymous v. Daniel (March 14,2016); Civil Appeal 6903/12 Canwest Global Communications Corp. Azor (July 22,2015); Civil Appeal Authority 10520/03 Ben Gvir v. Dankner (November 12,2006); Section 19 of the Prohibition of Defamation Law.
- The defendants argued that the immediate and public amendment on their part constitutes a consideration for relief in damages, and that to the extent that damages are to be awarded, they should be only symbolic (paragraph 41 of their summaries).
Section 19(4) of the Prohibition of Defamation Law states: