Adjudication No. 269 (February 1986) [1986] APC 5

ADJUDICATION No. 269 (February 1986)

B'nai B'rith of Australia and New Zealand has complained that an article "B'nai B'rith's sharp knives" published in Hrvatski Tjednik, a Croatian weekly, on June 25, 1985, is anti-Semitic.

The article makes a number of extraordinary statements about B'nai B'rith and Israel and concludes: "There is no more an independent Court in the United States. B'nai B'rith run the United States. B'nai B'rith has ready its sharpened knives."

As the complainant points out, the argument that Jewish organisations run the world is a classic case of conspiracy theory which has been used by antiSemites for the past century. The article contains a number of wild and unsubstantiated allegations that are typical of the kind of propaganda that has been used to stir up anti-Jewish prejudice and justify racial persecution. There is no place for such material in the Press of this country.

The paper printed a letter of complaint from B'nai B'rith, but failed to respond to a request for apology and retraction. While the publication of the complaint is a mitigating circumstance, the Press Council is of the view that the offending material should not have been published in the first place.

The Press Council upholds the complaint and censures Hrvatski Tjednik.