The Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court heard testimony on Tuesday in a defamation suit brought by Channel 12 and its legal affairs correspondent Guy Peleg against Channel 14 host Yinon Magal, with Magal telling the court that the post at the heart of the case was satire.
The suit, filed nearly two years ago, seeks NIS 1 million in damages over posts Magal published on X and Telegram that the plaintiffs say were false and damaging to their reputations.
The case centers on a post Magal published on November 4, 2024, in which he claimed Peleg had been detained by the Shin Bet following Channel 12’s broadcast of footage from the Sde Teiman affair. “Cleared for publication: Channel 12 journalist Guy Peleg has been held for about a week in a Shin Bet interrogation facility following the broadcast of the fabricated video that harmed the soldiers of Force 100, endangered the hostages and sparked a wave of antisemitism around the world,” Magal wrote. “So far he has not been allowed to see a lawyer. There is a gag order on the rest of the investigation details.”
According to the statement of claim, Peleg was never arrested, never held in a Shin Bet facility and was never prevented from meeting a lawyer. The plaintiffs said no investigation of the kind Magal described ever took place and that no gag order was issued.
Peleg and Channel 12 argued that the post was presented to the public as reliable factual news even though Magal knew it was false. They said rumors of Peleg’s supposed arrest spread widely, prompting questions from his family members, including his children, as well as from colleagues, friends and senior figures at the news company. Through their attorneys, Dr. Yisgav Nakdimon, Dikla Biran and Yarden Ibtzan, the plaintiffs are seeking removal of the posts, a published correction and retraction, and NIS 1 million in damages.
In his testimony, Peleg said hundreds of people had contacted him out of concern. “Not even five million would compensate me for what this terrible man did to me,” he said. When Magal’s attorney described the post as a joke, Peleg responded: “A joke? In your eyes. The court will decide if it’s funny.”
Magal maintained that the post was written as satire and that his followers understood it as such. His attorney, Michael Dvorin, told the court that discourse on X is “cynical and sarcastic” and described the post as “a joke, maybe not funny.”
“Some of the texts I put out, it’s clear to any reasonable person that it’s ridiculous,” Magal testified. “The punchline is that you don’t put a punchline, you don’t put an emoji. It was clear to me that anyone who reads this will understand it’s a joke.” At one point he raised his voice and declared: “They’re putting me on trial like Dreyfus!”
In his written defense, Magal has also characterized the lawsuit as a SLAPP suit filed by a business and political rival to silence him. the7eye
The footage in question was broadcast by Channel 12 on August 6, 2024, and purported to show troops abusing a Palestinian detainee at the Sde Teiman facility in southern Israel. Former Military Advocate General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi later admitted that she leaked the surveillance video to Peleg. Peleg faces separate litigation over the affair: Force 100 soldiers and the Honenu organization have filed an NIS 18 million lawsuit against Tomer-Yerushalmi, Peleg, Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and other defendants, alleging false imprisonment, leaking of investigation materials and defamation. Reporter who published leaked Sde Teiman video hounded by right-wing activists in Tel Aviv +2
Tuesday’s evidentiary hearing was the first and only one in the case. Judge Meital Tzafroni ordered the parties to submit written summations within 45 days.
