The Israeli government’s failed attempt to bar an ex-Mossad agent from publishing a “tell-all” book about the Israeli intelligence agency appears to have back-fired.
In fact, the American publisher of Victor Ostrovsky’s book is finding there is much more interest in “By Way of Deception: A devastating Insider’s View of the Mossad” than there was before the controversy erupted.
Among other things, the book alleges that Israel deliberately avoided providing the United States with advance information it had about Lebanese terrorists’ plans to bomb the United States Marine barracks in Beirut in October 1983.
The book alleges that Israel withheld the information from the United States, because it knew the incident, which claimed 241 lives, would strain U.S.-Arab relations.
Until the Israeli government tried to stop St. Martin’s Press from publishing the book, the company had received orders for just 48,000 copies, according to the firm’s president, Roy Gainsburgh.
But since a judge temporarily banned publication of the book last week, an order that was overturned a day later by a higher court, phones at St. Martin’s have been “ringing off the hook” with orders, Gainsburgh said, and the firm is now printing 200,000 copies.
“If people are foolish enough to try and stop publication of a book in this country,” Gainsburgh said, “then this is what they get — the book becomes much more popular. This is just the kind of book that the First Amendment protects, a book criticizing the government. This is a victory for free speech,” he said.
BREAK-IN AT CANADIAN PUBLISHER
Gainsburgh was celebrating the ruling issued late last Thursday by the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan. It quashed a restraining order issued by a Supreme Court judge early the day before on distribution or further publication of the book until a full trial could be heard.
The Israeli government’s effort to bar publication of the book was overturned on the basis that it failed to substantiate its claims that the book would endanger the lives of Israeli agents.
The ruling noted that “any grant of injunctive relief” to the State of Israel would not be effective, since the book had already been distributed to about 1,500 wholesalers and reviewers.
But the legal battle may not be entirely over. Israel’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying the government “will pursue the actions it has already filed to enforce.”
Publication of the book remains banned in Canada, pending a hearing Monday morning by the Ontario Supreme Court on the merits of a restraining order brought against Stoddart Publishing Co. Ltd. of Toronto.
Stoddart’s offices were broken into on Friday night, according to unconfirmed reports, but the pertinent files had been hidden, and only a petty-cash box was reported to have been stolen.
Nevertheless, files and desks were pried opened in what Toronto police called a professional job.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
