ASydneyMuslim cleric has been ordered by the federal court to take down a series of“fundamentally racist and antisemitic”speeches posted online, and instructed by a judge not to make similar addresses again.
Wissam Haddad – whose legal first name is William but who is also known as Abu Ousayd – has been successfully sued by two senior members of Australia’s peak Jewish body, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), over a series of lectures he gave at the Al Madina Dawah Centre in Bankstown in November 2023 – subsequently broadcast online – in which, the court found, he maligned Jewish people.
On Tuesday, Justice Stewart found Haddadbreached section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act, which prohibits offensive behaviour based on race or ethnic origin.
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“The court has found that the series of lectures, titled ‘The Jews of Al Madina’, conveys disparaging imputations against Jewish people that, in all the circumstances, were reasonably likely to offend, insult, humiliate and intimidate Jews in Australia.
“The imputations include age-old tropes against Jewish people that are fundamentally racist and antisemitic; they make perverse generalisations against Jewish people as a group.”
In his speeches, Haddad quoted and offered interpretation ofayatfrom the Qur’an andhadith, and described Jewish people as “mischievous”, “treacherous” and “vile”. His defence told the court the speeches concerned historical writings about Jewish people in Medina in the 7th century CE, at the time of the prophet Muhammad.
His defence also argued the lectures were given for an educational purpose, and that they could not be found to have breached section 18C because they were not public, but rather addressed to a private Muslim audience.
But the complainants told court Haddad used “overtly dehumanising” language about Jewish people and that he revelled in being “deliberately provocative and inflammatory”. The court heard the speeches were made in the knowledge they would be broadcast online, with microphones and cameras set up to record them.
Peter Wertheim, one of the claimants in the case and ECAJ co-chief executive, gave evidence that Haddad’s speeches “making derogatory generalisations, calling Jews a vile and treacherous people, calling them rats and cowards … are things which I think would be experienced by most Jews as dehumanising”.
Justice Stewart said Jewish people in Australia would have found Haddad’s lecture “harassing and intimidating” and said the context of the speeches’ delivery – as conflict raged in Gaza – had exacerbated their impact.
“The lectures were delivered at a time of heightened vulnerability and fragility experienced by Jews in Australia following the attack by Hamas on 7 October 2023, Israel’s bombardment and blockade of Gaza in response, and resultant solidarity protests and other actions in Australia.”
In his judgment, Justice Stewart pointedly stated that criticism of Israel, or of the actions of the Israel Defense Forces, was not inherently antisemitic.
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“Political criticism of Israel, however inflammatory or adversarial, is not by its nature, criticism of Jews in general or based on Jewish racial or ethnic identity.
“The conclusion that it is not antisemitic to criticise Israel is the corollary of the conclusion that to blame Jews for the actions of Israel is antisemitic; the one flows from the other.”
The court rejected two constitutional arguments made by Haddad: that part 2A of the Racial Discrimination Act (including section 18C) was beyond the power of the parliament to legislate because it conflicted with the implied freedom of political communication; or that it contravened section 116 of the constitution as a law “prohibiting the free exercise of any religion”.
The court ordered Haddad to remove the speeches from the internet, and not to make similar public addresses in future. Lawyers for both sides will address the court on the manner and wording of any “corrective notice” required to be published.
Wertheim, and co-claimant Robert Goot, did not seek damages. The court has ordered Haddad to pay the claimants’ costs.