שמו החדש (תחת צא”פ) של דודו דיגמי, סוחר הנשים הגדול בישראל: דוד לוי
Lately, I’ve been reporting a great deal about Israeli censorship of the press and social media. I’ve especially focussed on my exposing the identity of Judge Shamai Becker, who was once accused of raping his daughter. At the behest of the Israeli cyber crimes unit chief, Haim Vismonsky, two different sets of my tweets (in both English and Hebrew) were censored in Israel.
Now, a new case has come to light concerning former Haaretz reporter, Sharon Shpurer, who covered the trials of Israeli sex trafficker, Dudu Digmi, who was convicted of crimes on two continents but escaped all punishment after becoming a cooperating state witness.
Digmi’s one legitimate business foray was in real estate, where he formed a development company. On her Facebook page, Shpurer called the company “dubious.” She suggested that potential customers beware of patronizing it based on its owner’s shady past. On the strength of this, the firm, Urban Real Estate, sued her for libel. This was a SLAPP suit personified, a lawsuit by a powerful corporate interest designed to stifle awareness of an issue of legitimate interest to the public. Unfortunately, there is no anti-SLAPP law in Israel. And given the Alice in Wonderland nature of the Israeli judicial system, the company sstanda to win a $400,000 judgement against her if it prevails.
A member of the Israeli gossip forum, Rotter, has “outed” Digmi’s new identity, which is David Levy. This name is under gag order in Israeli courts. I am always happy to name sinners who the system seeks to protect. And I hope Vismonsky comes after me and Twitter on this matter as well so I can say that he’s protecting not only accused rapists, but now convicted sex traffickers. I would suggest you tweet the following hashtag: #dududigmiisdavidlevy in English and Hebrew
Shpurer’s supporters have created a legal defense fund to pay for her current and future expenses. I will try to add a link to it when I get it, if you wish to donate.
Richard – to my understanding the company (Urban – which is owned by the person you are mentioning) didn’t yet win the suit.
http://www.the7eye.org.il/210980
The trial itself is in the early stages – it went through some pre-trial motions (and wasn’t thrown out), but the company has not won yet and no damages were assessed.
Obviously facing a 1.6 MNIS potential damages is quite the definition of SLAPP.
Shpurer’s friends did raise quite a bit of money + pledges (of 560 NIS each) to cover the fine. The amount of pledges currently exceeds the damages requested (and not yet granted). See the pledge run here –
http://act.zazim.org.il/sign/freepress_sharon_pledge_he
@lepxii: thanks for the correction. I’ve updated the post to reflect this.
The lawsuit was only filed, not won. The full sum was raised within days.
this is the link and i think its closed due to the success, more than 4000 people signed in a few days.http://act.zazim.org.il/sign/freepress_sharon_pledge_he
I read this expose in Hebrew. It is one of the most sickening things I’ve ever read.
Only in Israel can scum like Digmi rise to the top and become a member of Israel’s business elite. He has full immunity and protection from the police, which to my mind confirms that he has LOTS of dirt about crooked cops who patronized his brothels.
Great work, Richard! Keep exposing dirty Israeli secrets that the state is working so hard to cover up.
@Richard
” who was once accused of raping his daughter. ”
What you’d earlier said was the the Judge was investigated for either raping his daughter, or fondling his daughter. You’ve omitted the, alternate, fondling claim.
Danny… Only in Israel? Really? That there are criminals in Israel also? What a shock
I didn’t even bother reading through the details as it doesn’t even matter. Whether it’s correct or not, Richard is just looking for negative stories about Israel.
Every country in the world has bad apples, corrupt judges, bribery etc etc etc. Israel is no special pumpkin, people are people. There are good people and bad people. However when you run a blog whose sole purpose is pointing out the negative of a place, then that’s all you see.
I live in Canada, and if I wanted to , I could cherry pick stories to make this place look like the most awful place in the world.
And Richard really, what’s the point? You have plenty of negative things about your own country you can focus on if you’d like..
@Moshe: Boo-hoo!! Poor old Moish afraid Israel is so fragile it’ll keel over & die from undue exposure of its sins.
BTW, this blog offers repeated criticism of U.S. foreign & domestic policy. Read more, carp less.