Preacher Wissam Haddad allegedly portrayed Jews as ‘filthy liars, cowards’

Australia’s peak Jewish body has alleged preacher Wissam Haddad defamed its community in sermons containing almost 40 defamatory imputations, including that Jews were ‘cowards, liars and schemers’.

Sydney-based Muslim preacher Wissam Haddad, also known as Abu Ousayd, arrives at Sydney’s Federal Court in December. Picture: NewsWire

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Australia’s peak Jewish body has alleged that radical Sydney preacher Wissam Haddad defamed their community in at least five sermons that carried almost 40 defamatory imputations, including that Jews were “cowards, filthy, liars and schemers”.

Contained in the Executive Council of Australia Jewry’s statement of claim filed at Sydney’s Federal Court, two of the body’s leaders – the applicants in their case against Mr Haddad – allege that those imputations also conveyed that Jewish Australians were “mischievous and shifty … wicked people who love money, and abuse the weak and target Muslims”.

The ECAJ alleges that Mr Haddad contravened section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act, but the preacher – whose first name is William but who is also known as Abu Ousayd – will argue that his sermons were not directed at Australian Jews, nor likely to offend, and were taken from or in reference to religious texts, while being made in good faith and in the public interest.

The preacher also contends that the sermons were given in private and he did not authorise their online publication.

Mr Haddad will also pursue the same route One Nation senator Pauline Hanson unsuccessfully took in her own defamation defence last year against Greens counterpart Mehreen Faruqi: that section 18C “imposes an unjustified burden on the implied freedom of political communication”.

Mr Haddad, or speakers at his Al Madina Dawah Centre, which is also being sued, allegedly called Jewish people “descendants of pigs and monkeys”, recited parables about their killing, described them as “treacherous ­people” with their “hands” in media and business, and urged people to “spit” on Israel so Israelis “would drown”.

Wissam Haddad, also known as Abu Ousayd, in a screen grab taken from social media. Picture: supplied

ECAJ deputy president Robert Goot and co-chief executive Peter Wertheim alleged that Mr Haddad breached 18C by delivering five sermons that were “reasonably likely to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate” Jewish Australians.

The sermons allegedly conveyed that Jewish Australians:

• Are very shifty … and want to obtain money and power for nefarious means.

• Control the media in order to abuse the weak or target ­Muslims.

• Own most banks and use oppressive interest rates, knowing it is almost impossible to pay the loans back.

• Are slanderous people, troublemakers and schemers … cowards, filthy, conspiratorial, liars, schemers and racists.

• Love wealth, use the media for manipulation, and want to attack women and children.

• Control the media and right wing politicians, who are under their command.

In the statement of claim, solicitors Deutsche Miller detail where the alleged imputations arise from more than 100 pages of transcripts from Mr Haddad’s sermons.

In December, Judge Angus Stewart – who in November ruled that Ms Hanson racially vilified fellow senator Ms Faruqi – said “upon quick reading” the imputations alleged were “damning”, ahead of a possible four-day June hearing.

But Mr Haddad’s solicitor, Elias Tabchouri, argued that the sermons were made in private, and neither his client nor the centre had uploaded them online. He said they were made in good faith, in the public interest, and must be viewed in the context of the religious texts they referred to and the Israel-Hamas war.

ECAJ deputy president Robert Goot.

ECAJ co-chief executive Peter Wertheim. Picture: Thomas Lisson

The sermons were posted on the Al Madina Dawah’s YouTube and Rumble pages, which are run by volunteers allegedly without Mr Haddad’s oversight, but most have since been taken down.

Mr Haddad contends that a majority of the imputations were rooted in the Koran or Islamic anecdotes, and that sermons were also prepared “in response to requests from (his) community” for content that discussed the Israel-Hamas war.

His defence says his sermons should be read in light of the “the historical and current religious and political context of the Muslim-Jewish polemic of the region”.

Mr Tabchouri contends that his client’s legal fight involves a constitutional matter, namely that 18C imposes an “unjustified burden” on the freedom of political communication and could restrict the freedom of religion.

In December, Justice Stewart said if any implied political freedom defence was being sought – such as Senator Hanson had – he would “unlikely be persuaded” that he “was wrong (about that judgment)”, finding then that any minor restriction was “justified”.

The ECAJ is seeking a declaration that Mr Haddad and his Al Madina Dawah contravened 18C and orders to remove the offending sermons from the internet.

The case comes amid a backdrop of anti-Semitic attacks, particularly in NSW, where the Minns government introduced a new criminal provision outlawing inciting racial hatred, albeit with a very specific religion-based exemption.

In February, Mr Haddad was one of more than 50 members from Australia’s Muslim community who backed two Sydney nurses who had vowed to “kill” Israeli patients, and recently helped establish an Al Madina Dawah affiliate centre in Melbourne, the Al Bayyinah Islamic Centre.