Prof. Richard Landes' The Augean Stables leads the coverage of today's defeat for France2's Charles Enderlin.
The Jerusalem Post has an extensive article putting today's Karsenty/al-Dura victory in perspective:
The French Court of Appeals on Wednesday found in favor of Philippe Karsenty, overturning a lower court decision that he had libeled France 2 and its Middle East correspondent Charles Enderlin when he accused them of knowingly misleading the world public about the death of the Palestinian child Mohammed al-Dura in the Gaza Strip in 2000.
"The verdict means we have the right to say France 2 broadcast a fake news report, that [al-Dura's shooting] was a staged hoax and that they duped everybody - without being sued," Karsenty told The Jerusalem Post shortly after the verdict was issued at 1:30 p.m. Paris time.
A statement forwarded to The Jerusalem Post from Enderlin noted that "the appeals court ruled that Karsenty's words were, in fact, libelous, and that Karsenty failed to prove that the news was staged and/or false." The statement added that the case was nevertheless overturned because "the court believed Karsenty had the right to stridently criticize the [France 2] report, since it dealt with an emotional topic, and that Karsenty's investigation into the matter convinced the court he was bring sincere."
A source close to Enderlin's side of the case explained that "you can get out of a libel suit either by proving you're right, or by showing you were sincere and had some research. The court found the latter to be the case."
The source also said Enderlin and France 2 would appeal the verdict, noting that they had won three out of four instances of judgment in the matter.
But, replied Karsenty, the only appeal left would be to France's Supreme Court.
"If they continue to insist they are correct," added Karsenty, "we will have victims of terror attacks that directly resulted from the [al-Dura] footage sue France 2."
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