Dressed to win: How Antoinette Lattouf slayed the first week of her landmark court case against the ABC in style with Louis Vuitton and Jimmy Choo accessories worth THOUSANDS

Journalist Antoinette Lattouf has wowed in a fashion show of chic designer outfits and accessories worth thousands in the first week of her court case against the ABC.

Lattouf was stylishly attired every day at the Federal Court in Sydney where she was  grilled by the broadcaster’s lawyers over her allegation of unlawful termination.

The ABC dropped her from her fill-in radio show host role after a furious row blew up about her pro-Palestinian stance on social media over the Hamas-Israel conflict.

In last week’s courthouse catwalk, Lattouf showcased outfits designed by a fellow Middle-Eastern Australian to complement accessories by the likes of Jimmy Choo and Louis Vuitton.

She has raised $171,065 so far of her target $180,000 total via a GoFundMe page entitled the #WeStandWithAntoinette solidarity fund. 

Lattouf has been challenged over her legal claims that her employment was terminated based on her political opinions and her race, and that this breached the ABC’s enterprise agreement. 

The row that led to her axing erupted after she was employed as a fill-in host for a week on ABC Radio Sydney’s Mornings program in December 2023.

She was taken off air three days into the contract for posting on social media about the conflict in Gaza after she shared a Human Rights Watch post on Instagram, with the caption ‘HRW reporting starvation as a tool of war’ in Gaza.

The Fair Work Commission found Lattouf had been sacked, dismissing the ABC’s argument that she wasn’t because she was paid for the full five days. 

MONDAY

On day one of the unlawful termination claim, Lattouf was dressed head to toe in a burgundy crepe pantsuit and carried a black $3,150 Louis Vuitton handbag.

In his opening statement, her lawyer Oshie Fagir said that the broadcaster had rejected Lattouf’s claim of racial discrimination, because she had not proved being Lebanese, Middle Eastern or Arab is a race.

Lattouf conceded some of her social media posts about the Israel-Gaza war ‘may be’ considered controversial but she was only sharing ‘facts’, the court heard. 

Previously unheard correspondence between ABC executives revealed in court that the chief content officer, Chris Oliver-Taylor, said the journalist should never have been hired , and he told his team we have an ‘Antoinette problem’.

The court heard former ABC chair Ita Buttrose said she was receiving multiple complaints about Lattouf and she expressed her frustration she was still on air. 

‘Has Antoinette been replaced? I’m over getting emails about her,’ Buttrose wrote.

‘Why can’t she come down with flu or Covid or a stomach upset? We owe her nothing.’

TUESDAY

On day two of the case, Lattouf arrived in $560 black Tom Ford sunglasses flanked by her legal team.

She paired a $580 white satin Lillian Khallouf Classic Huda shirt with a long black skirt, and carried a $2,425 Jimmy Choo cocktail handbag.

Lillian Khallouf is a designer of classic wear who arrived in Australia after a childhood  in both Syria and Lebanon.

A key issue in the case is whether Lattouf was directed not to post anything on social media by the ABC, which in its defence says she was let go after breaching this direction as well as its editorial policies of impartiality.

In the witness box, Lattouf rejected that she was given a directive not to post on social media before she was taken off air.

She recalled being given a suggestion or invitation to ‘keep a low profile’ on social media by ABC Radio Sydney content director Elizabeth Green, after the ABC was ‘flooded with complaints from pro-Israel lobbyists’ about her presence on air.

She said that during a phone conversation on December 18, 2023, she ‘respectfully but gently pushed back’ after Green’s suggestion.

‘I said to (Green), “have I done or said anything wrong?” She said “no, I back you and your journalistic integrity”,’ Lattouf testified, adding the pair had agreed she would ‘stick to facts’ with ‘no conjecture or misinformation’. 

WEDNESDAY

On day three, and once again in Tom Ford sunglasses, Lattouf wore a white double-breasted pantsuit with white bustier top and carried what looked like a white padded Chanel handbag for a fiery day of evidence.

Documents released in court showed Lattouf had reported receiving death threats after she was taken off air, including one from an anonymous man who threatened ‘I will find you and end you and shut your antisemitic mouth once and for all’.

In an affidavit released by the court, Lattouf detailed dozens of death threats and abusive and threatening messages she had received since December 2023.

In May last year, a woman called, screaming ‘Go back to Gaza’ and ‘I wish you and your kids were in that tent in Rafah’ and ‘watch your back’.

During Wednesday’s evidence, the outgoing managing director of the ABC, David Anderson, told the court he believed Australia was a racist country.

‘We have racism in our country… I don’t know how you can deny racism in this country,’ he said.

This was during cross-examination by Lattouf’s barrister who raised the case of the ABC’s 7.30 program chief political correspondent, Laura Tingle, telling a writers’ festival ‘Australia is a racist country’.

Anderson agreed Tingle was not taken off air for the remark, with Fagir saying, ‘Ms Lattouf can’t make a public statement which is not impartial, but Laura Tingle can: that’s the fact of the matter, isn’t it?’

He said that his client was held to a different standard to other ABC presenters.

THURSDAY

On the fourth day of the hearing, Lattouf wore a navy blue double-breasted pin-striped jacket and matching long skirt and carried an Oroton satchel.

She arrived to find that the trial was behind schedule, and the five days would now stretch into a second week.

Mark Spurway, an acting ABC Radio Sydney manager at the time, said a decision had been made to take Lattouf off air and that it had ‘come completely out of the blue’.

But the managing director David Anderson denied it had undermined the broadcaster’s reputation for independence and integrity.

‘No, I don’t believe it’s undermined its reputation for independence. I think the outcome of this trial will determine whether or not it’s affected the ABC’s integrity,’ he told the court.

Asked whether he thought there was ‘a Lebanese race in your view or not’, Anderson replied, ‘I haven’t formed a view as to whether there is or there isn’t’, but said, ‘If somebody tells me they’re Lebanese, I don’t question whether they mean it’s race or national identity.’

He conceded that he believed Lattouf’s appointment ‘a mistake’ because she advocated for ‘one perspective’ on the Israel-Gaza war.

After looking at her social media, Anderson said he had ‘concerns that we had put someone with a publicly stated partisan position on a current contentious issue [on air] … and they’re hosting talkback radio with the community’.

FRIDAY

The fifth day of hearings was meant to be the final day, but there was not enough time for Ita Buttrose to testify, meaning the former ABC chair would have to appear this week.

Lattouf reverted to designer Lillian Khallouf for her outfit, donning a $1,200 white ‘Elle’ dress in natural, which can double as a mini wedding gown.

Pairing the dress with Dune London white pumps and again carrying the $2,425 Jimmy Choo black box cocktail clutch, she turned up for the mega day of hearings looking tense.

Dominating the huge day of evidence, was ABC content chief Chris Oliver-Taylor’s six hours on the stand, many of them being grilled by Lattouf’s lawyer.

The court heard he’d been warned to ‘tread carefully’ over disciplining Lattouf for her social media posts about Israel-Gaza issues war because there was a ‘high chance’ this ‘would make it a very big and very public issue’.

He said he’d been between a’rock and a hard place’ as there was ‘pressure from above’ and Ms Buttrose ‘was directly writing to me, the chair’s office and the chair were directly forwarding me more and more and more concerns and naming me as a respondent in the claims’.

The trial will resume on Tuesday and conclude on Wednesday, hearing evidence from four ABC executives and Ms Buttrose.