The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 6 agreed to hear a widow’s lawsuit against the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in the killing of her husband by terrorists.
At the same time, the court also agreed to hear a related case, United States v. PLO. The two appeals have been consolidated and will be heard together on a date that has yet to be determined.
The new decision came after a federal appeals court held for the PLO and Palestinian Authority (PA) and dismissed the lawsuit. Congress previously passed a law directing courts to hear victims’ claims.
The Biden administration, which argues that the federal statute is constitutional, urged the Supreme Court to hear Fuld’s case.
The PSJVTA is a 2019 amendment to the federal Anti-Terrorism Act which created a right for victims of terror attacks committed against Americans outside the United States to sue in U.S. courts. The Anti-Terrorism Act was inspired by a lawsuit brought against the PLO for the 1985 killing of wheelchair-bound American cruise ship passenger Leon Klinghoffer “who was shot in the face and thrown into the sea by PLO hijackers,” the petition said.
The PSJVTA provides that the PLO and the Palestinian Authority are considered to have agreed to be sued in U.S. courts if they hand out payments “to terrorists for killing or injuring Americans.” The Palestinian Authority operates a so-called martyrs’ fund that provides payments to the families of Palestinians killed, imprisoned, or injured when committing acts of violence against Israel.
Fuld filed her lawsuit in federal court in New York after her husband Ari Fuld was killed near a West Bank shopping mall in 2018 by a Palestinian terrorist allegedly incited by the PLO. Other victims of terrorism and their families also sued in the same legal proceeding, the petition said.
Following a seven-week trial, a jury held in January 2022 that PLO and PA employees were “acting within the scope of their employment, [and] had planned or participated in each of the attacks.” The plaintiffs were awarded $218.5 million for damages, a figure that was then tripled under federal law.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed in September 2023, finding the lower court did not have legal authority to hear the case.
The circuit court determined that the parties sued have the right to due process because “neither the PLO or nor the PA is recognized by the United States as a sovereign state.” U.S. courts could not hear the case because the defendants were “at home” in “Palestine” and because the acts complained of took place “entirely outside the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.”
If the Supreme Court hears the case early in the new year, a decision would likely follow by June 2025.
