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Tombstone Storm: Can Beilinson Hospital sue for defamation?

Beilinson Hospital is threatening to take legal action against the client of the tombstone in which it is written that he murdered the deceased.

In the event that he is sued for defamation, what are the chances of winning being a corporate body and not an individual?

Interpretation

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• gravestone

• Beilinson

• Defamation

Adv. Saar Gershuni

Tuesday, 26 October 2021, 14:38 Updated: 15:15

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There are pictures that you only have to look at once in order to be well engraved in memory. Such is also the picture from the Yarkon cemetery that flooded the various social networks and media at the beginning of the week. For those who still missed it, this is a picture of a fresh gravestone placed on the grave of a woman who recently died from corona virus complications. On the woman's condition, which was not vaccinated and was also known to be resistant to vaccines, appeared the leaked caption: "Murdered by Beilinson Hospital in the Corona Department. The name will be a dummy."

According to media reports, after Beilinson Hospital verified that this was indeed a real condition and that the woman whose grave was lying on her grave had actually been hospitalized in their corona ward, a complaint was filed on his behalf with the police for incitement to violence.

Still, it's hard to let go of the deep shock of the family blaming the hospital for the death of a woman who has not been vaccinated, all while the medical staff have been doing day and night nights for over a year and a half.

Against this background, the question arises - are there any legal steps that the hospital can take to signal that a red line has been crossed here this time?

More on Walla!

"We are all Beilinson": The hospitals are in a show of solidarity following the caption on the tombstone

To the full article

An image engraved in memory.

The monument in question (Photo: Walla !, official website)

I believe that the main legal tool available in these circumstances to the hospital is the use of the Prohibition of Bad Sleep Act and the filing of a lawsuit against the family, or at least against her son who according to media reports was the one who sought to put the caption on the tombstone.

The Defamation Prohibition Act states that defamation is "something whose publication may humiliate a person or make him a target of contempt or ridicule" and all this, the law defines, "due to an act, conduct or trait attributed to him". Does this definition apply to the case before us? On the face of it, the inscription on the tombstone according to which the hospital and the corona ward murdered the woman, constitutes a serious accusation that if it is not true it could harm the hospital and the medical staff.

An examination of the other conditions set forth in the law for the existence of the tort, such as whether a caption on her condition is considered publication, also appears to be met in his case. The main obstacle that must be overcome in order to succeed in a defamation lawsuit in this case concerns the term "person" that appears in the law.

It is clear from the law as well as from common sense that if the caption in her condition had been addressed, for example, to the department head or another doctor who treated the deceased - the same person would have a defamation lawsuit that is not so complex to prove.

But can the "Corona Department at Beilinson Hospital" also be considered a person for the purpose of proving wrongdoing under the law?

Can the hospital be considered a "person"?

(Photo: Flash 90, Yossi Aloni)

Adv. Saar Gershuni (Photo: Uri Livni)

In the past, the answer to this essential question was not so clear, in light of the existing contradiction between the Defamation Law and the Torts Ordinance, which is a mandatory inheritance that preceded the law and whose provisions apply to changes that also require defamation matters. Thus, the Torts Ordinance provides that a corporation is not entitled to compensation for wrongdoing unless it has been harmed.

The point is that proving damage, especially in matters of defamation, is not such a simple craft. This is exactly the reason why the Defamation Prohibition Law stipulates that a person who has proven that defamation has been published against him can receive compensation of up to NIS 50,000 without proof of damage. Indeed, most of the damages rulings in defamation lawsuits relate to publications for which the damage has not been proven.

But in 2016, the Supreme Court ruled that a corporation - like the hospital and its corona ward - also has a basic right to a good name.

The Supreme Court further ruled that a good name is an asset like all the assets of a corporation, and that it should be allowed to protect it.

The Supreme Court referred to the fact that in many cases there is difficulty in proving the damage caused by the defamation, and ruled that a corporation and an individual should not be discriminated against by requiring the corporation to prove damage.

All that is left for the hospital now is to decide whether it would be morally and publicly right to wage a legal battle against the family of the deceased, who must be in a state of emotional turmoil due to the untimely death of their loved one.

To the extent that the hospital believes that the interest of its good name outweighs these considerations, I believe it has no good chance at all of proving the cause of action.

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