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\n Apr. 16, 2026
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An Israeli court on Sunday dismissed a libel suit filed by New York Times journalist Ronen Bergman against Gadi Taub, a prominent intellectual on Israel\u2019s political right. Taub had argued that Bergman\u2019s reporting jeopardized the Mossad\u2019s 2024 pager operation against Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
Bergman said this week that he plans to appeal. The case became a rare wartime legal clash over public discourse and journalistic ethics, pitting two prominent figures from opposite ends of Israel\u2019s increasingly polarized media landscape against each other.<\/p>\n
The ruling also came amid a wave of lawsuits over right-wing rhetoric online. In dismissing the suit and ordering Bergman to pay 15,000 shekels (about $5,000) in court costs, the court upheld Taub\u2019s right to criticize what he has called \u201cthe Ronen Bergman method.\u201d Taub uses that phrase to describe what he sees as a symbiotic relationship between unelected defense officials seeking to shape Israeli policy and a journalist who gives them access to international media in exchange for exclusive information.<\/p>\n
Taub, a frequent op-ed contributor <\/a>to JNS, has argued that this dynamic, while not unique to Israel, became dangerous in Bergman\u2019s coverage of the pager operation shortly before it was carried out.<\/p>\n Tel Aviv Magistrate\u2019s Court Judge Lior Gelbard wrote that Bergman had failed to prove the central claim in his suit, in which he sought 330,000 shekels (about $109,000) in damages. Bergman had argued that Taub defamed him personally by suggesting his reporting, based on leaks from defense officials allegedly trying to block the operation, had endangered the mission.<\/p>\n \u201cTaub criticized [Bergman\u2019s] journalism, which he [Taub] said \u2018faithfully echoes\u2019 the security establishment,\u201d Gelbard wrote. The criticism, he added, \u201capparently also was directed at Bergman, but it does not seem from [Taub\u2019s] text that Bergman knew about the pager operation or tried to thwart it. Bergman is not the focus of the article, the establishment is.\u201d<\/p>\n Taub made the remarks on X and on his podcast, Shomer Saf (\u201cGatekeeper\u201d), in response to an article by Bergman in Yedioth Ahronoth, where Bergman also writes in addition to his work for the New York Times.<\/p>\n That article appeared one day before the Sept. 17, 2024 pager operation, in which Mossad detonated thousands of booby-trapped pagers it had sold to Hezbollah through front companies for use by the group\u2019s mid-level and some senior officers. The operation crippled Hezbollah\u2019s middle management and is widely seen as a major turning point in Israel\u2019s war against Hezbollah and Iran.<\/p>\n In the Yedioth article, Bergman wrote that unnamed \u201csenior officials in the IDF and other parts of the security establishment\u201d were warning against \u201creckless steps planned by the Israeli government in the North.\u201d He described those steps as \u201ca significant and deliberate escalation, including a ground operation in Lebanon.\u201d Bergman, a critic of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government, quoted the sources as saying the government was trying to appear as though it was \u201cdoing something,\u201d but that \u201cthis something is the most misguided, the most dangerous thing. Exactly what we have been avoiding all last year. Instead of solving the problem, it could entangle us in a much more difficult problem.\u201d<\/p>\n In his lawsuit, Bergman also said Taub defamed him by calling him the defense establishment\u2019s \u201cpersonal spokesperson\u201d and \u201ccourt reporter.\u201d Gelbard rejected that argument as well, ruling that Taub\u2019s criticism was legitimate and too general to meet the threshold for defamation.<\/p>\n Before filing suit, Bergman publicly denounced Taub\u2019s allegations on X as \u201cheinous lies\u201d and described Taub as one of several \u201csubmissive amplifiers and eunuchs\u201d of Netanyahu, Gelbard noted. That response, the judge wrote, showed that Bergman already had effective means of answering public criticism.<\/p>\n Contacted by JNS, Taub declined to comment, citing Bergman\u2019s plans to appeal.<\/p>\n Taub did address the ruling on Tuesday on Israel Update, the Tablet podcast he co-hosts with Mike Doran. There, he described <\/a>Bergman\u2019s suit as a SLAPP\u2014a strategic lawsuit against public participation\u2014meant to suppress public debate.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a systematic tool that the rich in Israel\u2014the rich, privileged leftists\u2014are using in order to dominate public discourse and preserve the monopoly they have lost, because now we have our own channels: social media, the Israel Update podcast, and also my show,\u201d said Taub.<\/p>\n Taub launched Gatekeeper during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and expanded it further after Haaretz stopped accepting his op-eds in 2023 because of his support for the Netanyahu government\u2019s judicial reform.<\/p>\n