The Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization gained a legal victory at the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday as the justices refused to consider reinstating a $655.5 million jury award won against them by 11 American families over terrorist attacks in Israel.
The families sought damages over seven terrorist attacks that took place in the Jerusalem area from 2001 to 2004, in which 33 people, including several Americans, were killed and 450 others were wounded, claiming that the attacks were perpetrated by security officers and other agents of the Palestinian Authority.
The court declined to hear the families' appeal of a lower court's 2016 ruling throwing out the jury award that was secured in a lawsuit brought under the Anti-Terrorism Act, a law allowing American victims of international terrorism to seek damages in U.S. courts.
"It's outrageous that the murderous Palestinian Authority is allowed to kill innocent civilians and not have to pay any cost. This is a horrible travesty of justice for the families and we will not let it stand," said Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, president of the Shurat Hadin-Israel Law Center, which represents the American families.
The PLO's chief representative in Washington, Husam Zomlot, said in a statement that "this decision reaffirms the vital relationship between the Palestinian and American people, which depends on mutual respect and, as importantly, on respect for the rule of law."
President Donald Trump's administration had sided with the Palestinian Authority and PLO in the dispute, urging the justices not to take up the case because the specific claims could not be brought under the Anti-Terrorism Act.
"The United States condemns acts of terror in the strongest terms and the Department of Justice is committed to prosecuting those who commit terrorist attacks against innocent human beings to the fullest extent that the law allows," U.S. Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said.
The attacks at the center of the lawsuit have been attributed to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the Fatah's military wing and the Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas' military wing. Lead plaintiff Mark Sokolow, his wife and their two daughters were injured in a 2002 suicide bombing in Jerusalem.
The New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered that the civil lawsuit, which began in January 2004, be dismissed. The appeals court said the attacks occurred "entirely outside" U.S. territory, and found no evidence that Americans were targeted. As a result, American courts do not have jurisdiction to hear the claims, it said.
The families said late PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, who died in 2004, and his agents routinely arranged for payments to terrorists and their families. The Palestinian Authority and PLO have said they condemned the attacks and blamed them on rogue individuals within the organizations acting on their own.
In 2015, after a six-week trial, a federal jury in Manhattan awarded the families $218.5 million, which was tripled automatically to $655.5 million under the Anti-Terrorism Act.
Theodore Olson, a Washington lawyer representing the families, urged the Supreme Court to hear the case and overrule the appeals court decision, saying that it eviscerated a critical component of American anti-terrorism policy.
Olson called the ruling "astonishing" and said the appeals court ruling "cut the heart out" of the anti-terrorism law, "draining it of its indisputable purpose – protecting U.S. citizens from international terrorism."
In a statement explaining its position, the Justice Department said it "sympathizes deeply with the American families," but said the court of appeals ruled that "the suit was not consistent with due process under the Constitution, and its decision does not meet the usual standards for Supreme Court review."
In a separate case on a similar theme, the Supreme Court in February blocked a group of Americans injured in a 1997 suicide bombing in Jerusalem from seizing ancient Persian artifacts from a Chicago museum to satisfy a $71.5 million court judgment against Iran, which they had accused of complicity in the attack.
The Supreme Court in another case is weighing whether Jordan-based Arab Bank Plc can be sued over legal claims that it helped finance terrorist attacks in Israel. A ruling is due by the end of June.
