Israeli police shut down Israeli website.

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From Scoop: http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0312/S00223.htm

Israel Police Shut Down Indymedia-Israel
Tuesday, 30 December 2003, 10:08 am
Article: Indymedia

Israel Govt Shuts Down Indymedia-Israel
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) states in a letter to the Attorney General of Israel: ''The investigation against Indymedia Israel has turned into intimidation, harming Freedom of Speech on the Internet.''

See? indymedia.org.il/
(Translated from Hebrew)

Police investigators are attempting to throw responsibility on Indymedia Israel?s operators, for publications appearing in the ?open publishing zone? of the website. This is done illegally and against the recommendations of a professional committee of the Israel Ministry of Justice.

The Indymedia Israel website provides a free and open stage for surfers on the Internet. Approximately three weeks ago, a surfer outside of Israel published a caricature in the open publishing zone of the website, in which the Israeli Prime Minister is portrayed passionately kissing the leader of Nazi Germany. Subsequent to this, the Attorney General of Israel ordered the opening of an investigation against the website?s administrators, for incitement and insulting a public figure.

Today, attorney Avner Pinchuk of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) sent a letter to the Israel Attorney General demanding an immediate end to the investigation. Attorney Pinchuk claims that the moment the police realized the site?s operators did not publish the publication, it was illegitimate to harass them with an investigation. Worse than this, the police investigators are attempting to ?convince? the site?s operators to commit themselves to continual censorship over all publications in the open publishing zone of the site. By doing this, the investigators deviate from their authority in an attempt to impose on the Israeli Internet arena, norms which are against both the law and the position of most professionals working in the field, in Israel and abroad?including a special committee of the Israel Ministry of Justice.

Electronic billboards, like that of Indymedia Israel, are very common on the Internet and are used by many individuals and communities wishing to exchange information and opinions freely. As opposed to the global process of concentration of the media and debate in the hands of a few, the public platform of the Internet provides a unique ground for free, democratic dialogue. Indeed, in the open publishing zone, some offensive expressions might appear, such as slander or abuse of privacy. However, the general opinion of judges and legislators from all over the world holds that, in almost all cases, responsibility should not be laid upon the providers of Internet services?website operators that allow an open publishing zone for the entire surfing public. This is also the opinion of a special committee of the Israeli Ministry of Justice, which presently discusses this issue.

Now however, when legislators and judges around the world deny that website operators have civil responsibility for ''guest'' publications, and at the very moment that the Ministry of Justice committee discusses the design of legal arrangements that will explicitly anchor these conceptions in law, the police investigation team makes up its own norms, claiming criminal responsibility, and even worse, hurrying to impose them in practice using an harassing and bullying investigation against the website operators, demanding behavior according to a ?legal policy? that they made-up.

Attorney Pinchuk adds that making the website operators supervise and censor all publications that are published on the open platform will bring the majority of websites to extinction. Many websites that don?t posses resources can not fulfill the demands for pre-supervision and will rather cancel the open publishing system. Other sites attempting to avoid potential indictment and interrogation will act to aggressively censor, only to assure themselves against intimidation, indictments and other charges. Therefore, analogous to what happened in other public domains, dialogue on the Internet will be reduced to a domain controlled and supervised by and for the few.

Fear of abuse on the internet, says Attorney Pinchuk, must not bring about the destruction of the platform itself. We can assume that the invention of the airplane assisted criminals occasionally to escape, but the solution to this problem lies in the field of extradition law and international agreements, not in the destruction of airplanes or placing responsibility on pilots or stewardesses.

Therefore, Attorney Pinchuk requests a permanent end to the investigation and a cessation of harassment against the website operators for publications published by others on the open platform on the website.

-------
Shamai Leibowitz, lawyer for Indymedia Israel, adds: ''This is a dangerous attempt by the Israeli government, to quash Freedom of Speech and the Freedom to Disseminate Information. It uses fear and threats in order to suppress critique of the Israeli government and what is occurring in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. This police investigation reminds us, to our deep regret, of the situation in the book 1984 by George Orwell.''

*******
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) states in a letter to the Attorney General of Israel: ''The investigation against Indymedia Israel has turned into intimidation, harming Freedom of Speech on the Internet.''

Interesting news for Israel - possibly for the internet?

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Bad move on the part of the Israeli government. Shame on them!

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As i rather doubt that repressive government organs anywhere need any encouragement to censor their critics, i doubt that this will mean much to the internet in general. It's a shame for the Israelis, though, of course. Sharon's government seems to be about as friendly to the notion of a free society as our dear Mr. Ashcroft.

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Wonder if the outcry will change anything?

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Hard to tell, i've heard and read of Israeli "security force" staff refusing to serve in the "occupied territories," but then don't necessarily hear any "follow-up" on the subject . . .

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Setanta wrote:

As i rather doubt that repressive government organs anywhere need any encouragement to censor their critics, i doubt that this will mean much to the internet in general. It's a shame for the Israelis, though, of course. Sharon's government seems to be about as friendly to the notion of a free society as our dear Mr. Ashcroft.

Much as it pains me to do this...

...I gotta acknowledge that this comment of Setanta's captures my sentiments exactly -- and I doubt I could put that thought into any better words.

So I will just add a loud AMEN!

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Bunny faints!

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Hmm - re the "follow-up" - I do keep hearing about Israeli military folk doing that - including pilots, I thought? I might have made it up, though.

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It would be interesting to hear what Steissd would have to say on the topic . . .

Cheers, Frank . . .

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The Israeli Indymedia site is a bit of an outcast even within the Indymedia "world". There has been a lot of clamoring in the past from other Indymedia sites to have the Isreali site dumped from the network and they've been having on-going feuds with their Web hosting service.

Quote:

However, the general opinion of judges and legislators from all over the world holds that, in almost all cases, responsibility should not be laid upon the providers of Internet services?website operators that allow an open publishing zone for the entire surfing public.

This is a bit of twisting of words on their part. WWW site operators have been held liable for slanderous posts on many occassions. There is no "protection" as they claim. The courts have ruled in favor of ISPs that exert no editorial control but IndyMedia isn't an ISP and they do exert editorial control over content on their site. The ISP is Actcom - not IndyMedia Israel.

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Fishin' have a look here: http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=9035

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Craven de Kere wrote:

Fishin' have a look here: http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=9035

That ruling applies for "republishing" (cutting and pasting what somneone else has already published) - not for being the original.

Also significant here is that the "Big 3" cases in the US that have decisions as far as content liability have all been civil cases. There are some protections from being sued by a 3rd party but nothing that allows a service provider to continue to maintain pages that violate criminal law (which is what the Isreali Government is pushing in this case..).

This case is very similar to the French government prosecution of Yahoo for allowing Nazi content in their search engine.

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But isn't the problem related to user-submitted content? It's a ruling that has no bearing on Israel but they may have a leg to stand on when they cite the spirit of the law. For e.g. the ruling about bloggers has been seen by the company offering the blog space as a defense against legal woes.

But then again we don't even have to go to France to see a conflicting issue. Heck Google in the US has been censored many times and they have had to remove content from their listings. And Google isn't responsible at all for any of the content.

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Craven de Kere wrote:

But isn't the problem related to user-submitted content? It's a ruling that has no bearing on Israel but they may have a leg to stand on when they cite the spirit of the law.

It is realted to user-submitted contect but it is also related to the type of content. From what I read in the ruling the idea was that a blog user isn't likely to have the resources to check facts so there should be some leeway made for someone that cuts and pastes (republishes) an article from elsewhere - the courts put the onus of verification on the originator not someone that makes a later copy.

If you slandered someone here on A2K (a violation of civil law) and I copy your post to my blog I'm not the originator - you are. I and the people that run my blog site wouldn't be responsible for it regardless of what it says... That protection doesn't extend to you though. The person slandered could still come after you (and A2K) as the originator.

If the posted item was something that violated criminal law then you, A2K, me and my blog host could all face criminal penalties.

(The criminal cases filed against the WWW sites that ran pics and personal info on doctors that performed abortions is another good example of the criminal liability side..)

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I agree, but to me what Isreal is doing is tantamount to, say, England prosecuting someone for saying "We should abandon the monarchy".

Which is also their right is I understand it correctly.

What I don't get is why the site doesn't simply move to a foreign server.

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They are trying to move their site right now. Their old site is shut down right now while they are in the process.

It looks like the biggest issue was the tie-in with Nazism which, like it is with much of Europe, is a much bigger deal than it is here in the US. We don't have criminal laws that prevent people from promoting Nazism or any other extremist political belief.

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Yep, but we have even stupider ones like the DMCA. I'd prefer the ones against Nazi speech.

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Hmmm - thing is, as I read it, that it was NOT promoting Nazism, but, in the case mentioned, was using the abhorrence of Nazism to make a political/satirical point. Presumably, the extreme reaction was due to natural Israeli sensitivity to accusations of Nazism - and the reaction was against the advice of the country's own professional committee advising their justice dept. on such matters.

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I'd agree that it was probably due to a sensitivity about nazism but there may actually be more to it. I don't know how their law deals with things like implying that someone is "in bed with" or "kissing up to" Nazis. Doing that alone may very well be illegal.

Also, keep in mind that is it only their claim that the committee advising their Justice Dept recommended against taking any action. I would be surprised to find that any goverment put a committee together to study just one incident.

I suspect the committee was working on a much broader question and this group is twisting things a bit to put their case in a better light in the court of public opinion just as they did with their claims about how other governments have reacted in regards to handling of service providers.

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Oh, yes, I assume that the professional committee is a standing advisory committee - such as governments often form.

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Israeli police shut down Israeli website.

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