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As Justice Michael Lee might say, this isn’t so much coming back for his hat as coming back for her keffiyeh. Lee was referring to the fact that, having avoided a criminal trial for rape, Bruce Lehrmann was perhaps less than wise to pursue a civil defamation case. Odious ‘academic’ , clearly puffed up with hubris from the train-wreck that was the ignominious demise of lefty groupthink fest, the Adelaide Writers Week, is launching multiple defamation actions against South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas.
His lawyers are already perusing the luxury car catalogues for a new addition to the garage.
Truth, after all, is a complete defence against defamation in Australia. If you can prove that your statement was substantially true: boom. Done.
In an Instagram post, Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah said Mr Malinauskas had made “false claims” in a FIVEAA radio interview on January 14 after she was removed from the Adelaide Writers Week and that she had “no choice but to serve a second concerns notice on him”.
Bring it on, chortle the lawyers.
Prominent Jewish leader and lawyer Mark Leibler says he hopes Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah’s defamation matter over South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas goes to court, insisting there can be “only one finding”.
After all, what did Malinauskas say about her?
The Premier said: “Dr Abdel-Fattah’s views, in my view, are extremist, she was posting images on her own social media sympathising with the October 7 attacks, where hundreds of Jewish people were murdered, innocent children, people held hostage. She argued in favour of Jewish people not receiving cultural safety at these types of events. I think this crosses a line.”
And?
Mr Leibler, pre-eminent tax lawyer and national chairman of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, told the Australian he hoped and prayed the case went to court.
“If it goes to court, there can only be one finding. In what world are those things she has posted ... not antisemitic?
After all, Abdel-Fattah did do, within hours of the October 7 attacks, was change her social media profile picture to an image of a Hamas terrorist carrying out the massacre. She did say that “zionists” have “no claim or right to cultural safety”. She did coach little children to chant “Intifada” – a call for violence against Jews. She did call for the complete destruction of Israel. She did blatantly deny the undeniable evidence of brutal mass rapes by Hamas terrorists.
Her own boss, Macquarie University vice-chancellor Bruce Dowton, conceded that she had made anti-Semitic statements, but weaselled out of sacking her, claiming that “the term was not well-defined in law”, which is a load of bollocks.
She is already getting tripped up by her own words.
Anti-Israel activist Randa Abdel-Fattah kept the image of a Palestinian paratrooper as her Facebook cover photo for at least five months after Hamas terrorists’ murder, rape and kidnapping of 1200 Israelis had become apparent.
Dr Abdel-Fattah, whose removal from the Adelaide Writers Week program this month triggered the withdrawal of 180 authors, the dissolution of the festival’s board, the resignation of director Louise Adler and ultimately the cancellation of the event, has previously defended her decision to post the image one day after Hamas terrorists used paragliders to launch a massacre of Jews on October 7, 2023.
She told the ABC this week she had “no idea about the death toll’’ when choosing the image of a parachute in the colours of the Palestinian flag as her cover image. However, the Australian can reveal the confronting picture still featured on her Facebook page at the end of March 2024.
It seems even the dimmest bulbs, though, get the occasional flicker of self-awareness. Or, more likely, frantic calls from their lawyers.
On Tuesday, Dr Abdel-Fattah’s Facebook page was wiped of all images and posts.
Got something to hide, have we?
