The Balad Party, which has used the color orange in its flag and literature since 1999, claimed that the use of orange in the anti-expulsion campaign will cause the party monetary damage, as well as affect its freedom of assembly and speech.
While not claiming ownership of the color, the party stated that the right-wing had taken over a symbol recognizable as Balad's. "The color orange is clearly a political symbol associated with Balad," party leader MK Azmi Bishara said, "and in spirit, it has become ours."
Haifa District Court Justice Yitzchak Amit did not agree, ruling today that the suit must be thrown out "in its entirety."
"The whole country is full of orange flags," the ruling stated, "and the color orange has long been associated with the disengagement-opposing public. Anyone walking down the street over the past few months encounters the color orange in this connection. Orange ribbons and stickers are widely and publicly given out, and on comedy programs they have even started singing, 'So just sing a song of katom [orange; a play on words on the famous song, 'So just sing a song of shalom, peace].'"
The court dealt with the question of whether a color could become a trademark. "A color by itself," the court ruled, as opposed to a color together with an identifying sign, "is neutral, and cannot become the subject of a patent, a trademark, or copyrighted." Judge Amit further wrote, "Colors, by their very nature, must remain open for public use, and the Trademarks Registrar must prevent a situation in which a particular element will purchase exclusivity on a particular color."
Judge Amit said that the color orange alone is not Balad's trademark, but rather the letter D in Hebrew and Arabic together with the color orange.
The court also rejected Balad's claim that the public might be deceived by the use of the same color by two different groups. Judge Amit said that in this particular case, there is no hint of deception, in that the public associated with Balad is not at all the public associated with Yesha (Judea and Samaria).
Balad's lawyers did not let up, and claimed that it was precisely the ideological difference between the two publics that could cause the problem. The use of orange by the right-wing, they said, might cause the Arab public to turn away from the party symbolized by that color.
Justice Amit countered, first of all, that he is not convinced that "the appellants have the right to speak in the name of the entire Arab public in Israel. But regardless of that, the court wonders why the negative feelings of the Arab public gives the right to have a monopoly over a certain color. Monopolies, in general, are not a favorite of the courts - not in business, and most certainly not in politics."
"The framework of freedom of speech," Justice Amit wrote, "also includes the freedom to use a certain color, even if others don't like it."
He ordered Balad and Bishara to pay the Yesha Council 20,000 shekels, and another 5,000 shekels to the Land of Israel Northern Task Force.