CAIR-backed lawsuit defeated in federal court
The Lawfare Project, together with co-counsel Ken Turkel and David Hayes of Turkel Cuva Barrios Guerra, P.A., has secured the dismissal of all claims in a lawsuit against Gadi Beer and his wife, a Pennsylvania Jewish couple sued for sharing a link to an attorney’s publicly available law firm profile and speaking out against her anti-Jewish social media posts.
In an Aug. 27 ruling, U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Becerra of the Southern District of Florida rejected all four claims brought by former Chartwell Law attorney Zohra Khorashi and ordered the case closed.
Khorashi sued the Beers after losing her job following public criticism of her social media posts. She alleged that they had “doxed” her and caused her firing by identifying her employer and sharing a link to her publicly available law firm profile in an Instagram comment thread. Khorashi’s legal team included attorneys from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).
CAIR was established by former leaders of a Hamas-linked organization and was subsequently named by federal prosecutors as an unindicted co-conspirator in a terrorism-financing trial in which the Holy Land Foundation and five of its leaders were convicted of funneling more than $12 million to Hamas.
The court rejected Khorashi’s claims that the Beers unlawfully interfered with her employment, holding that providing truthful information cannot support those claims under Florida law. The court also found that Khorashi had not adequately connected the Beers’ comments to her firing. Her own complaint attributed her termination to a separate social media post that she did not allege the Beers had helped create.
The court separately rejected a defamation claim, holding that the alleged implication of a comment about Khorashi’s public posts—that Khorashi was antisemitic and unfit to represent Jewish clients—was a subjective opinion, not a factual assertion that could be proven false. It also dismissed a conspiracy claim because Khorashi had not alleged sufficient facts to support it.
“People who speak out against antisemitism should not have to face meritless lawsuits for sharing truthful public information and expressing their views,” said Benjamin Ryberg, attorney and chief operating officer at The Lawfare Project. “CAIR has a history of bringing or backing lawsuits targeting speech it opposes. This attempt to turn lawful speech into a basis for liability failed: the court dismissed every claim. Gadi and his wife stood their ground and The Lawfare Project will continue to defend those who speak out against Jew-hatred.”
The court dismissed the employment interference and defamation claims with prejudice, finding that further amendment would be futile. It dismissed the conspiracy claim without prejudice but did not grant permission to amend it in this action. No claims remain pending in the case.