Legal Defender of Israel Speaks at Melbourne Chabad

Nitsana Darshan Leitner is an Israeli attorney, a human rights activist and the founder of Shurat HaDin Israel Law Centre. She is renowned for the civil actions her law firm has brought against numerous banks and institutions that have aided and abetted Islamic terrorism. In 2014 she was named one of the 50 most influential Jews by The Jerusalem Post. On Tuesday, August 29, she spoke to a packed room at Chabad CBD-Melbourne.

The evening was chaired by Chabad CBD-Melbourne Shliach Rabbi Chaim Herzog.

Below are some of the highlights of her speech:

The Lod Airport massacre occurred in May 1972, when 26 people were killed – including 17 Christian pilgrims. North Korea was the sponsor of the mission. Yet with the innovative creative mind of Israeli lawyers her team found a way. Shurat HaDin sued North Korea against their frozen bank accounts in the US from 1972. They enforced judgements against the bank accounts.

Remember the Turkish Flotilla of 2010 and the photos instantly available worldwide to show the Israelis as the perpetrators of violence? This time it was a Greek armada arranged to show support of the Palestinian Authority. The Israel Law Centre put their heads together and came up with a clever plan. What do you need before you can sail? Marine insurance. There are only so many Marine Insurance Companies. With swift research and action they managed to contact all of them, informed them of the purpose of the voyage, and all the biggest companies pulled out.

In September 2012, the Palestinian Authority was upgraded to Observer Status in UN. Soon after, Israel was indicted for War Crimes.

Yet there is one aspect which is new, and has magnified terrorism targeted at Israelis worldwide, and that of course is Social Media, with Facebook being the major source of terror recruitment. The ironic fact is that when Israel Law Centre asked them to remove the posts, they refused, despite the fact that they were calculated to incite anti-Semitism.

It came as a surprise to Nitsana to discover there was no terrorism protection on Social Media. So basically anyone can say, incite do anything they want and there was no safeguards. The second thing she found out was that there was no relationship between users and the company. No responsibility whatsoever. So the minds at the Israel Law Centre set to work. They created two identical posts, one against Israel and the other against the Palestinians. They asked Facebook to take down the posts as they were offensive and incitement to hatred. Facebook took down the Palestinian post, and left the Israeli one.