The legal battle between former Israel Defense Forces Spokesman Brig. Gen. (ret.) Avi Benayahu and the McCann Erickson ad agency, over a 2011 ad which has since been linked to the Hazpaz Affair, saw the parties lock horns in court once more on Sunday, this time over the witnesses McCann Erickson seeks to have appear on its behalf.
Benayahu's attorneys slammed the 15-people witness list as a ploy meant to drag out the legal proceedings, while McCann Erickson's lawyers said that the former military spokesman was trying to "manipulate the court."
Benayahu filed a 2.5 million shekel (roughly $690,000) defamation lawsuit against McCann-Erickson in early 2011, after it sponsored an anonymous ad accusing him and other senior military officers of plotting to thwart the nomination of Maj. Gen. Yoav Galant (now retired) for the position of IDF chief of staff. Haaretz and Yedioth Aharonoth newspapers are also named in the suit, for running the ad.
The full-page ad featured scathing criticism against Benayahu, as well as then-IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi and Lt.-Col. (res.) Boaz Harpaz, for their role in torpedoing Galant's appointment. Signed by "Citizens who do not personally know Galant," the ad alleged that the three's "putsch in the Defense Ministry has (apparently) succeeded."
The ensuing scandal bred the now infamous Harpaz Affair, which exposed the murky personal and professional relationship between Ashkenazi and then-Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and eventually led to a formal inquiry by both the State Comptroller's Office and the police.
In late August, McCann Erickson Chairman Ilan Shiloah admitted that he was the driving force behind the controversial ad, saying it was "a form of political protest" and that it expressed his "own, personal opinion."
The ad agency sough to have 15 "essential witnesses" appear before the court, including Ashkenazi, Harpaz, Col. Erez Wiener, who served as Ashkenazi's aide at the time, Channel 1 commentator Ayala Hasson and senior Yedioth Aharonoth analysts Alex Fishman and Dr. Ronen Bergman. Benayahu's attorneys, however, argued that calling 15 witnesses is meant to complicate the legal proceeding and drag it out.
Benayahu's attorneys further accused McCann Erickson's defense team of including slanderous statements in the briefs they filed with the court, thus abusing the immunity parties involved in an ongoing libel suit have against being sued over defamatory statements included in their defense briefs.
"This is a grave and suspicious attempt, the kind of which has never before been seen in a civil proceeding, to hinder due process," McCann Erickson told the Lod-based Central District Court, where the case is being heard, on Sunday.
The ad agency's defense team further slammed Benayahu, "who is expected, as the plaintiff in this suit, to lend the court any assistance necessary in its quest for the truth. Benayahu is afraid that the truth will come out and is trying to manipulate the court and prevent the witnesses from taking the stand."
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