The U.S. Supreme Court recently, in the Fuld v. Palestine Liberation Organization case, confirmed that U.S. victims of Palestinian terrorism can sue over their injuries, and for damages, and it’s already being used to seek justice.
It’s the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that has lifted its abatement, or pause, on actions against the PLO by 70 people who were hurt, or are survivors of those who were killed, by that very terrorism. The order overturned a district court’s dismissal of the case and ordered the dispute back into district court for consideration of the claims.
In the Fuld case, a group of U.S. citizens injured by PLO terrorism, or the estates and survivors of victims who were murdered, sued the PLO as well as the Palestinian Authority, back in 2004.
The PLO runs Palestine’s foreign affairs, and the PA is an interim governing body for parts of the Gaza Strip.
They have more recently been in the news over the Hamas terror attack on Israel in 2003 in which some 1,200 Israeli civilians were murdered, often in horrific fashion, and hundreds more were kidnapped.
In the 2004 case, the plaintiffs sought damages under the Anti-Terrorism Act and a jury found the defendants liable for six attacks and awarded $218.5 million in damages, automatically tripled to $655.5 million under the Anti-Terrorism Act.
But the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said U.S. courts lacked personal jurisdiction over the PLO and PA. Then Congress in 2019 adopted the Promoting Security and Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act, which deems the defendants have consented to jurisdiction in U.S. courts “if they engaged in certain conduct after the law’s enactment: either making payments to families of deceased terrorists or designees of imprisoned terrorists who harmed U.S. nationals, or conducting various activities within the United States (with some exceptions for UN-related activities).”
When the court found defendants had, in fact, made qualifying payments, the 2nd Circuit then claimed the case violated due process.
The Supreme Court reversed, ordering that the law does not violate due process.
The result is that the 10th Circuit withdrew its pause on the new case.
A report from Courthousenews explains the case is on behalf of 70 surviving family members of people killed in a 2014 synagogue attack in Israel.
The report explained it was on Nov. 18, 2014, when two members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, or PFLP, “killed U.S. citizens and Rabbis Kalman Levine, Aryeh Kupinsky and Moshe Twersky during morning prayers at the Congregation Bnei Torah synagogue in the Har Nof neighborhood of Jerusalem. Police sergeant Zidan Saif and Rabbi Abraham Goldberg were also among the six people killed in the attack.”
The attackers were killed by police, but celebrated as heroes by Palestinian officials.
The relatives sued the PLO and PA in 2021, charging violations of the U.S. law, the Promoting Security and Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act.
“The families claimed the defendant groups used a ‘pay for slay’ scheme to incentivize people to carry out terrorist attacks and suicide bombings in exchange for compensation to their families. Congress has declared both the Palestine Liberation Organization and the PFLP terrorist groups,” the report said.
The district judge in the case, Biden-appointee Gordon Gallagher, had dismissed the families’ complaint, and the 10th Circuit then stepped in and paused action pending the Fuld decision, which now is precedent.
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Author: Bob Unruh
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