Supreme Court Judge Yitzhak Amit rejected the request for leave to appeal filed by journalist Yigal Sarna, after he was ordered to compensate Prime Minister Netanyahu and his wife Sara in the amount of 100,000 shekels.
Sarna argued in his request for leave to appeal that this is a "silence claim" since the post that is the subject of the claim does not constitute defamation, and that the conclusion that can be drawn about the respondents from the event described in the post is true.
Sarna also claimed that the Magistrate and District Courts did not address the differences between advertising on the social network Facebook and advertising in institutional media outlets.
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In his decision, Judge Amit rejected Serena's claim that in defamation matters, a fundamental distinction must be made between advertising on Facebook and regular advertising. At the end of his decision, Judge Amit also rejected the claim that this was a claim for silencing.
The Netanyahu couple filed the lawsuit after Serena wrote in a post on his Facebook page that Sara Netanyahu ordered her husband to get out of their shared car while they were driving on Highway 1.
Following the post, a defamation lawsuit was filed. About six months ago, Judge Azaria Alkalai of the Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court ruled that the veteran journalist would compensate Prime Minister Netanyahu with 60,000 shekels and his wife Sara with 40,000 shekels. The court also ordered Serena to pay a fee of 15,000 shekels, in addition to paying the couple's lawyers' fees, totaling 15,000 shekels.
Sarna appealed to the District Court, which was rejected last January. However, despite the rejection of the appeal, Sarna filed a request for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court in February - which has now, as mentioned, also been rejected.
