The US Supreme Court voted unanimously on Friday to allow American families of victims of terror attacks in Israel to sue the Palestinian Authority.
Writing the opinion for the Court, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the US government has “strong interest in permitting American victims of international terror to pursue justice in domestic courts.”
The Court ruled that Congress has the authority to subject the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization to the jurisdiction of US federal courts, thus allowing victims of terror attacks perpetrated by PA citizens to sue for damages.
The decision was rendered in response to a lawsuit brought before the Court by the family of Ari Fuld, a dual US-Israeli citizen who was murdered in 2018 by a teenage Palestinian Authority terrorist.
Fuld was named plaintiff in the case before the Supreme Court, which said it “recognized the national government’s interest in holding accountable those who perpetrate an ‘act of violence against’ US nationals who, even when physically outside our borders, remain ‘under the particular protection’ of American law. So too the national government’s corresponding authority to make ‘the killing of an American abroad’ punishable as a federal offense ‘that can be prosecuted in [US] courts.”
The Palestinian Authority claimed in its brief to the Supreme Court that US courts have no jurisdiction over such cases because the PA does not “maintain any constitutionally meaningful connection to the United States.”
Ten years ago, a federal court awarded victims of Palestinian Authority terrorist attacks more than $650 million under the US Anti-Terrorism Act, a piece of legislation that was amended in 2019 to ensure terror victims could sue the attackers and the government that encourages them.
The law was challenged before the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled the legislation violated the Fifth Amendment, thus determining US courts have no jurisdiction over the Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization.
The Palestinian Authority, meanwhile, continues to incite its population to murderous attacks on Israeli and other Jews through school textbooks, state-run media, government-sponsored ceremonies and incentive payments to those who perpetrate such attacks, and their families when the perpetrators die in the attempts.
