25-06-2025
How does running a bitter, personal campaign get anyone to a better place?
More than 2000 people watched the livestream of the Lattouf judgement on Wednesday morning. But really it wasn't a judgement on the journalist Antoinette Lattouf. It was a judgement on the chaotic decision-making and processes at the ABC. This is what pressure does to you.
Justice Darryl Rangiah ruled in favour of Lattouf. He said the ABC had breached the Fair Work Act when it said she wasn't required for the last two days of her gig 18 months ago.
It contravened the bits of the Fair Work ACT which say you can't terminate someone for expressing a political opinion. The ABC also contravened its own enterprise agreement.
She was awarded $70,000 but I bet there will be more to come. Josh Bornstein, one of her lawyers, said outside the court that there were multiple contraventions of the Fair Work Act.
"We will be seeking significant penalties because we're concerned to ensure that this never happens again."
Pretty much everyone whose fingerprints appeared on this case is gone. The former chair of the ABC Ita Buttrose, gone (yeah, it's true she was going anyway but this didn't help her leave with armsful of garlands and bouquets).
The former managing director of the ABC David Anderson, gone. The former chief content officer of the ABC Chris Oliver-Taylor gone. Former manager ABC Sydney Steve Ahern gone. Former acting manager of ABC Sydney, Elizabeth Green, is now back to being a producer, and I'm hoping she's enjoying a quieter life. The only person left is Ben Latimer, director of audio. All of these people are mentioned in the judgment. All of these people are mentioned in the judgement.
Let me remind you what happened. Antoinette Lattouf had the honour of presenting mornings on ABC Sydney for five days while host Sarah Macdonald was on leave.
Anyone with any brains would (should) have known that Lattouf (like many of the rest of us) was concerned about what was happening in Gaza. I'm Jewish and I'm concerned about what's happening in Gaza. The Israeli government is systematically destroying that tiny slip of land. It is starving the inhabitants. Lattouf shared a post by Human Rights Watch and all hell broke loose.
Unfortunately, when you hold and express those views, the Zionist lobby loses its mind. On many occasions, it also conducts a campaign against those who express those views. Let me just say this. It is hard to divorce yourself from wanting Israel to survive in its current form. This is the place where Jews found sanctuary. But campaigning in a bitter and personal way against those who hold contrary views is wrong. It doesn't help us all get to a better place.
That campaigning is exactly what happened to Lattouf. And that's exactly why the ABC fell to bits, ignored various parts of the Fair Work Act and ended up making more trouble than the whole sorry scenario was worth in the first place.
When you hire people, you hire the whole person. It would be very surprising to me if no one at the ABC knew that Lattouf supported Palestine. What was she supposed to do? It's not like she was suddenly not going to be Antoinette Lattouf.
Plus, how embarrassing the ABC acted in haste because of a story being researched for a Murdoch publication. What was the result? Getting rid of a person because of a story which would be read by a handful of people. The judge said this: "The consternation of senior managers of the ABC turned into what can be described as a state of panic." That ended up with Lattouf pretty much being sent off.
I do genuinely love the way Hugh Marks responded to the judgement: "This matter has caused concerns to be expressed about the ABC's independence and integrity, which are critical to the great trust the Australian public places in us. Any undue influence or pressure on ABC management or any of its employees must always be guarded against." 100 per cent this.
It is so hard to write about difficult things. What happened in Israel on October 7, 2023, was appalling. What has happened in Gaza since October 8 is appalling.
Is it equivalent? 1200 people were murdered on October 7. So far, at least 60,000 have been killed in Gaza. It is a catastrophe and now the entire world is embroiled. As I've written elsewhere when reviewing Peter Beinart's brilliant book, Being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza, "This human suffering is immeasurable - and it has had a dramatic effect on the Jewish community across the world, tearing friends and family apart. Can you be a community that for centuries has experienced persecution and victimhood but turns away when asked to account for violence in your name?"
Zionist Jews do not seem willing to accept that what's happening in Gaza is wrong. And Lattouf is not the only person who's been a victim of a lobby group absolutely determined to silence any opposition to the behaviour of Israel. Barely a week ago, the ABC's flagship current affairs program 7.30, aired an interview with Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel. The ABC's Ombudsman's Office received 30 complaints, 27 of which alleged that the interviewer had an anti-Israel bias.
The reasons? According to the letters, the interviewer repeatedly interrupted the interviewee, challenged Haskel's answers and didn't include relevant context about Iran's nuclear program and human rights abuses. What of the other three complainants?
READ MORE JENNA PRICE:
They were concerned that Haskel was being interviewed at all because it provided a platform for her "offensive and incorrect claims by her, in particular that there is no starvation in Gaza".
Are we meant to be entering an era of journalism where we don't challenge whatever comes out of someone's mouth? I am sorry that Hugh Martin, the ABC's deputy ombudsman, has had to deal with this rubbish (and I'm sure it's a tiny fraction of what happened about Antoinette Lattouf).
Impartial does not mean brain dead. It doesn't mean sitting there and accepting whatever is said. Sometimes, interrupting is the only way forward, the only way of injecting facts into the discussion.
The Lattouf case is just one example of this kind of silencing behaviour and we must not, none of us, stand for it.
As Matthew Ricketson, professor of journalism at Deakin University, says: "As long as the ABC and politicians in general keep treating news as if it has a great deal of power then nothing will change."
More than 2000 people watched the livestream of the Lattouf judgement on Wednesday morning. But really it wasn't a judgement on the journalist Antoinette Lattouf. It was a judgement on the chaotic decision-making and processes at the ABC. This is what pressure does to you.
Justice Darryl Rangiah ruled in favour of Lattouf. He said the ABC had breached the Fair Work Act when it said she wasn't required for the last two days of her gig 18 months ago.
It contravened the bits of the Fair Work ACT which say you can't terminate someone for expressing a political opinion. The ABC also contravened its own enterprise agreement.
She was awarded $70,000 but I bet there will be more to come. Josh Bornstein, one of her lawyers, said outside the court that there were multiple contraventions of the Fair Work Act.
"We will be seeking significant penalties because we're concerned to ensure that this never happens again."
Pretty much everyone whose fingerprints appeared on this case is gone. The former chair of the ABC Ita Buttrose, gone (yeah, it's true she was going anyway but this didn't help her leave with armsful of garlands and bouquets).
The former managing director of the ABC David Anderson, gone. The former chief content officer of the ABC Chris Oliver-Taylor gone. Former manager ABC Sydney Steve Ahern gone. Former acting manager of ABC Sydney, Elizabeth Green, is now back to being a producer, and I'm hoping she's enjoying a quieter life. The only person left is Ben Latimer, director of audio. All of these people are mentioned in the judgment. All of these people are mentioned in the judgement.
Let me remind you what happened. Antoinette Lattouf had the honour of presenting mornings on ABC Sydney for five days while host Sarah Macdonald was on leave.
Anyone with any brains would (should) have known that Lattouf (like many of the rest of us) was concerned about what was happening in Gaza. I'm Jewish and I'm concerned about what's happening in Gaza. The Israeli government is systematically destroying that tiny slip of land. It is starving the inhabitants. Lattouf shared a post by Human Rights Watch and all hell broke loose.
Unfortunately, when you hold and express those views, the Zionist lobby loses its mind. On many occasions, it also conducts a campaign against those who express those views. Let me just say this. It is hard to divorce yourself from wanting Israel to survive in its current form. This is the place where Jews found sanctuary. But campaigning in a bitter and personal way against those who hold contrary views is wrong. It doesn't help us all get to a better place.
That campaigning is exactly what happened to Lattouf. And that's exactly why the ABC fell to bits, ignored various parts of the Fair Work Act and ended up making more trouble than the whole sorry scenario was worth in the first place.
When you hire people, you hire the whole person. It would be very surprising to me if no one at the ABC knew that Lattouf supported Palestine. What was she supposed to do? It's not like she was suddenly not going to be Antoinette Lattouf.
Plus, how embarrassing the ABC acted in haste because of a story being researched for a Murdoch publication. What was the result? Getting rid of a person because of a story which would be read by a handful of people. The judge said this: "The consternation of senior managers of the ABC turned into what can be described as a state of panic." That ended up with Lattouf pretty much being sent off.
I do genuinely love the way Hugh Marks responded to the judgement: "This matter has caused concerns to be expressed about the ABC's independence and integrity, which are critical to the great trust the Australian public places in us. Any undue influence or pressure on ABC management or any of its employees must always be guarded against." 100 per cent this.
It is so hard to write about difficult things. What happened in Israel on October 7, 2023, was appalling. What has happened in Gaza since October 8 is appalling.
Is it equivalent? 1200 people were murdered on October 7. So far, at least 60,000 have been killed in Gaza. It is a catastrophe and now the entire world is embroiled. As I've written elsewhere when reviewing Peter Beinart's brilliant book, Being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza, "This human suffering is immeasurable - and it has had a dramatic effect on the Jewish community across the world, tearing friends and family apart. Can you be a community that for centuries has experienced persecution and victimhood but turns away when asked to account for violence in your name?"
Zionist Jews do not seem willing to accept that what's happening in Gaza is wrong. And Lattouf is not the only person who's been a victim of a lobby group absolutely determined to silence any opposition to the behaviour of Israel. Barely a week ago, the ABC's flagship current affairs program 7.30, aired an interview with Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel. The ABC's Ombudsman's Office received 30 complaints, 27 of which alleged that the interviewer had an anti-Israel bias.
The reasons? According to the letters, the interviewer repeatedly interrupted the interviewee, challenged Haskel's answers and didn't include relevant context about Iran's nuclear program and human rights abuses. What of the other three complainants?
READ MORE JENNA PRICE:
They were concerned that Haskel was being interviewed at all because it provided a platform for her "offensive and incorrect claims by her, in particular that there is no starvation in Gaza".
Are we meant to be entering an era of journalism where we don't challenge whatever comes out of someone's mouth? I am sorry that Hugh Martin, the ABC's deputy ombudsman, has had to deal with this rubbish (and I'm sure it's a tiny fraction of what happened about Antoinette Lattouf).
Impartial does not mean brain dead. It doesn't mean sitting there and accepting whatever is said. Sometimes, interrupting is the only way forward, the only way of injecting facts into the discussion.
The Lattouf case is just one example of this kind of silencing behaviour and we must not, none of us, stand for it.
As Matthew Ricketson, professor of journalism at Deakin University, says: "As long as the ABC and politicians in general keep treating news as if it has a great deal of power then nothing will change."
More than 2000 people watched the livestream of the Lattouf judgement on Wednesday morning. But really it wasn't a judgement on the journalist Antoinette Lattouf. It was a judgement on the chaotic decision-making and processes at the ABC. This is what pressure does to you.
Justice Darryl Rangiah ruled in favour of Lattouf. He said the ABC had breached the Fair Work Act when it said she wasn't required for the last two days of her gig 18 months ago.
It contravened the bits of the Fair Work ACT which say you can't terminate someone for expressing a political opinion. The ABC also contravened its own enterprise agreement.
She was awarded $70,000 but I bet there will be more to come. Josh Bornstein, one of her lawyers, said outside the court that there were multiple contraventions of the Fair Work Act.
"We will be seeking significant penalties because we're concerned to ensure that this never happens again."
Pretty much everyone whose fingerprints appeared on this case is gone. The former chair of the ABC Ita Buttrose, gone (yeah, it's true she was going anyway but this didn't help her leave with armsful of garlands and bouquets).
The former managing director of the ABC David Anderson, gone. The former chief content officer of the ABC Chris Oliver-Taylor gone. Former manager ABC Sydney Steve Ahern gone. Former acting manager of ABC Sydney, Elizabeth Green, is now back to being a producer, and I'm hoping she's enjoying a quieter life. The only person left is Ben Latimer, director of audio. All of these people are mentioned in the judgment. All of these people are mentioned in the judgement.
Let me remind you what happened. Antoinette Lattouf had the honour of presenting mornings on ABC Sydney for five days while host Sarah Macdonald was on leave.
Anyone with any brains would (should) have known that Lattouf (like many of the rest of us) was concerned about what was happening in Gaza. I'm Jewish and I'm concerned about what's happening in Gaza. The Israeli government is systematically destroying that tiny slip of land. It is starving the inhabitants. Lattouf shared a post by Human Rights Watch and all hell broke loose.
Unfortunately, when you hold and express those views, the Zionist lobby loses its mind. On many occasions, it also conducts a campaign against those who express those views. Let me just say this. It is hard to divorce yourself from wanting Israel to survive in its current form. This is the place where Jews found sanctuary. But campaigning in a bitter and personal way against those who hold contrary views is wrong. It doesn't help us all get to a better place.
That campaigning is exactly what happened to Lattouf. And that's exactly why the ABC fell to bits, ignored various parts of the Fair Work Act and ended up making more trouble than the whole sorry scenario was worth in the first place.
When you hire people, you hire the whole person. It would be very surprising to me if no one at the ABC knew that Lattouf supported Palestine. What was she supposed to do? It's not like she was suddenly not going to be Antoinette Lattouf.
Plus, how embarrassing the ABC acted in haste because of a story being researched for a Murdoch publication. What was the result? Getting rid of a person because of a story which would be read by a handful of people. The judge said this: "The consternation of senior managers of the ABC turned into what can be described as a state of panic." That ended up with Lattouf pretty much being sent off.
I do genuinely love the way Hugh Marks responded to the judgement: "This matter has caused concerns to be expressed about the ABC's independence and integrity, which are critical to the great trust the Australian public places in us. Any undue influence or pressure on ABC management or any of its employees must always be guarded against." 100 per cent this.
It is so hard to write about difficult things. What happened in Israel on October 7, 2023, was appalling. What has happened in Gaza since October 8 is appalling.
Is it equivalent? 1200 people were murdered on October 7. So far, at least 60,000 have been killed in Gaza. It is a catastrophe and now the entire world is embroiled. As I've written elsewhere when reviewing Peter Beinart's brilliant book, Being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza, "This human suffering is immeasurable - and it has had a dramatic effect on the Jewish community across the world, tearing friends and family apart. Can you be a community that for centuries has experienced persecution and victimhood but turns away when asked to account for violence in your name?"
Zionist Jews do not seem willing to accept that what's happening in Gaza is wrong. And Lattouf is not the only person who's been a victim of a lobby group absolutely determined to silence any opposition to the behaviour of Israel. Barely a week ago, the ABC's flagship current affairs program 7.30, aired an interview with Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel. The ABC's Ombudsman's Office received 30 complaints, 27 of which alleged that the interviewer had an anti-Israel bias.
The reasons? According to the letters, the interviewer repeatedly interrupted the interviewee, challenged Haskel's answers and didn't include relevant context about Iran's nuclear program and human rights abuses. What of the other three complainants?
READ MORE JENNA PRICE:
They were concerned that Haskel was being interviewed at all because it provided a platform for her "offensive and incorrect claims by her, in particular that there is no starvation in Gaza".
Are we meant to be entering an era of journalism where we don't challenge whatever comes out of someone's mouth? I am sorry that Hugh Martin, the ABC's deputy ombudsman, has had to deal with this rubbish (and I'm sure it's a tiny fraction of what happened about Antoinette Lattouf).
Impartial does not mean brain dead. It doesn't mean sitting there and accepting whatever is said. Sometimes, interrupting is the only way forward, the only way of injecting facts into the discussion.
The Lattouf case is just one example of this kind of silencing behaviour and we must not, none of us, stand for it.
As Matthew Ricketson, professor of journalism at Deakin University, says: "As long as the ABC and politicians in general keep treating news as if it has a great deal of power then nothing will change."
More than 2000 people watched the livestream of the Lattouf judgement on Wednesday morning. But really it wasn't a judgement on the journalist Antoinette Lattouf. It was a judgement on the chaotic decision-making and processes at the ABC. This is what pressure does to you.
Justice Darryl Rangiah ruled in favour of Lattouf. He said the ABC had breached the Fair Work Act when it said she wasn't required for the last two days of her gig 18 months ago.
It contravened the bits of the Fair Work ACT which say you can't terminate someone for expressing a political opinion. The ABC also contravened its own enterprise agreement.
She was awarded $70,000 but I bet there will be more to come. Josh Bornstein, one of her lawyers, said outside the court that there were multiple contraventions of the Fair Work Act.
"We will be seeking significant penalties because we're concerned to ensure that this never happens again."
Pretty much everyone whose fingerprints appeared on this case is gone. The former chair of the ABC Ita Buttrose, gone (yeah, it's true she was going anyway but this didn't help her leave with armsful of garlands and bouquets).
The former managing director of the ABC David Anderson, gone. The former chief content officer of the ABC Chris Oliver-Taylor gone. Former manager ABC Sydney Steve Ahern gone. Former acting manager of ABC Sydney, Elizabeth Green, is now back to being a producer, and I'm hoping she's enjoying a quieter life. The only person left is Ben Latimer, director of audio. All of these people are mentioned in the judgment. All of these people are mentioned in the judgement.
Let me remind you what happened. Antoinette Lattouf had the honour of presenting mornings on ABC Sydney for five days while host Sarah Macdonald was on leave.
Anyone with any brains would (should) have known that Lattouf (like many of the rest of us) was concerned about what was happening in Gaza. I'm Jewish and I'm concerned about what's happening in Gaza. The Israeli government is systematically destroying that tiny slip of land. It is starving the inhabitants. Lattouf shared a post by Human Rights Watch and all hell broke loose.
Unfortunately, when you hold and express those views, the Zionist lobby loses its mind. On many occasions, it also conducts a campaign against those who express those views. Let me just say this. It is hard to divorce yourself from wanting Israel to survive in its current form. This is the place where Jews found sanctuary. But campaigning in a bitter and personal way against those who hold contrary views is wrong. It doesn't help us all get to a better place.
That campaigning is exactly what happened to Lattouf. And that's exactly why the ABC fell to bits, ignored various parts of the Fair Work Act and ended up making more trouble than the whole sorry scenario was worth in the first place.
When you hire people, you hire the whole person. It would be very surprising to me if no one at the ABC knew that Lattouf supported Palestine. What was she supposed to do? It's not like she was suddenly not going to be Antoinette Lattouf.
Plus, how embarrassing the ABC acted in haste because of a story being researched for a Murdoch publication. What was the result? Getting rid of a person because of a story which would be read by a handful of people. The judge said this: "The consternation of senior managers of the ABC turned into what can be described as a state of panic." That ended up with Lattouf pretty much being sent off.
I do genuinely love the way Hugh Marks responded to the judgement: "This matter has caused concerns to be expressed about the ABC's independence and integrity, which are critical to the great trust the Australian public places in us. Any undue influence or pressure on ABC management or any of its employees must always be guarded against." 100 per cent this.
It is so hard to write about difficult things. What happened in Israel on October 7, 2023, was appalling. What has happened in Gaza since October 8 is appalling.
Is it equivalent? 1200 people were murdered on October 7. So far, at least 60,000 have been killed in Gaza. It is a catastrophe and now the entire world is embroiled. As I've written elsewhere when reviewing Peter Beinart's brilliant book, Being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza, "This human suffering is immeasurable - and it has had a dramatic effect on the Jewish community across the world, tearing friends and family apart. Can you be a community that for centuries has experienced persecution and victimhood but turns away when asked to account for violence in your name?"
Zionist Jews do not seem willing to accept that what's happening in Gaza is wrong. And Lattouf is not the only person who's been a victim of a lobby group absolutely determined to silence any opposition to the behaviour of Israel. Barely a week ago, the ABC's flagship current affairs program 7.30, aired an interview with Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel. The ABC's Ombudsman's Office received 30 complaints, 27 of which alleged that the interviewer had an anti-Israel bias.
The reasons? According to the letters, the interviewer repeatedly interrupted the interviewee, challenged Haskel's answers and didn't include relevant context about Iran's nuclear program and human rights abuses. What of the other three complainants?
READ MORE JENNA PRICE:
They were concerned that Haskel was being interviewed at all because it provided a platform for her "offensive and incorrect claims by her, in particular that there is no starvation in Gaza".
Are we meant to be entering an era of journalism where we don't challenge whatever comes out of someone's mouth? I am sorry that Hugh Martin, the ABC's deputy ombudsman, has had to deal with this rubbish (and I'm sure it's a tiny fraction of what happened about Antoinette Lattouf).
Impartial does not mean brain dead. It doesn't mean sitting there and accepting whatever is said. Sometimes, interrupting is the only way forward, the only way of injecting facts into the discussion.
The Lattouf case is just one example of this kind of silencing behaviour and we must not, none of us, stand for it.
As Matthew Ricketson, professor of journalism at Deakin University, says: "As long as the ABC and politicians in general keep treating news as if it has a great deal of power then nothing will change."
