It seems like Google had more control over whether that lawsuit was filed than I thought. From FOSS Patents:
>A few months after that Zeitgeist talk, in January 2012, Google authorized a Motorola Mobility lawsuit against Apple over six patents in the Southern District of Florida. The merger agreement was publicly available and absolutely unequivocal about the fact that Motorola needed Google's consent prior to bringing new IP assertions while the merger was under antitrust review.
EDIT: Since it's not letting me reply to your comment, gonna post it here.
If you're talking about Motorola vs. Apple in general now, clearly Apple wasn't the aggressor. Motorola was the first to sue over patents prompting Apple to counter-sue.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Mobility_v._Apple_Inc.