NSW MP Shaoquett Moselmane drops defamation action

The NSW parliament’s first Muslim MP has withdrawn a defamation claim against The Australian newspaper.

The NSW parliament’s first Muslim MP has withdrawn defamation proceedings in which he claimed this newspaper depicted him as an anti-Semitic hypocrite who described Jewish advocacy groups as malicious and cancerous.

Shaoquett Moselmane, a member of the Labor Party, withdrew his claim for damages just before the case was due to go to trial in the NSW Supreme Court. The parties have agreed to pay their own costs.

Mr Moselmane had complained that the natural and ordinary meaning of a story published in February last year in The Australian and online was that he was a racist who had made an anti-Semitic speech. He had said the story, by reporter Sharri Markson, incorrectly suggested he was a hypocrite who had decried racism but held racist views towards Jews.

In a speech to parliament in 2013, Mr Moselmane referred to attacks on him by the Australian Israeli media and described political lobby groups as “cancerous” and “malicious”.

Markson, in an opinion piece, said Mr Moselmane had told the NSW parliament that Jewish advocacy groups tried to “deny, misinform and scaremonger”.

Markson and Nationwide News Pty Ltd, which publishes The Australian, denied the article conveyed the imputations asserted by Mr Moselmane. They also sought to defend the article on the grounds that it was Markson’s honest opinion, it was protected by qualified privilege and was a fair report about proceedings of public concern.

Their defence says Markson is a member of the Jewish faith and the defendants considered the publication of her opinions on the subject to be matters of important public debate.