ECAJ statement on legal proceedings under Part IIA of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 against Wissam Haddad (aka Abu Ousayd) and Al Madina Dawah Centre Incorporated.

The Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry (ECAJ), the peak body rep­res­ent­ing the Jewish community nation­ally, today announced that pro­ceed­ings have been commenced in the Federal Court of Australia against a self-described Islamic preacher, Wissam Haddad (aka Abu Ousayd), and a religious centre, Al Madina Dawah Centre Incor­por­ated, located in western Sydney, over speeches that were allegedly made at the centre late last year, record­ings of which have been uploaded online.

The pro­ceed­ings have been brought by the ECAJ’s co-CEO, Peter Wertheim AM, and Deputy President, Robert Goot AO SC (the applic­ants), under the pro­vi­sions of Part IIA of the Racial Dis­crim­in­a­tion Act 1975, which prohibit offensive behaviour based on racial hatred.

The documents filed with the court allege that the speeches included derog­at­ory gen­er­al­isa­tions about Jewish people, such as descrip­tions of them as a “vile people”, a “treach­er­ous people”, and claims that “their hands are in every­where – in busi­nesses … in the media”.

The applic­ants are seeking, among other things, declar­a­tions that the respond­ents con­tra­vened section 18C of the Racial Dis­crim­in­a­tion Act; injunc­tions requiring the speeches to be removed from the internet and restrain­ing the respond­ents from pub­lish­ing similar content in the future; an order requiring pub­lic­a­tion of a cor­rect­ive notice on the social media pages of Al Madina Dawah Centre Incor­por­ated; and an order for costs. No order for damages or monetary com­pens­a­tion is sought.

ECAJ co-CEO, Peter Wertheim said:

As is required by law, we attempted in good faith to resolve this matter by con­cili­ation through the Aus­trali­an Human Rights Com­mis­sion, but a con­cili­ated res­ol­u­tion could not be achieved.

Accord­ingly, we have commenced pro­ceed­ings in the Federal Court to defend the honour of our community, and as a warning to deter others seeking to mobilise racism in order to promote their political views.

Australia has long enjoyed a repu­ta­tion as a mul­ti­cul­tur­al success story where people of many different faiths and ethnic back­grounds have for the most part lived in harmony and mutual respect. We are all free to observe our faith and tra­di­tions within the bounds of Aus­trali­an law, and that should mean we do not bring the hatreds, pre­ju­dices and bigotry of overseas conflicts and societies into Australia.

Main­tain­ing and strength­en­ing social cohesion is the role of gov­ern­ments and gov­ern­ment agencies, but lately they have failed us. It should not fall on our community, or any other community, to take private legal action to remedy a public wrong, and to stand up to those who sow hatred in our midst. However, in the cir­cum­stances we feel we have no altern­at­ive.