Supreme Court Revives Lawsuits Seeking To Hold Palestine Liberation Organization Liable For Terrorist Attacks

The Supreme Court has revived lawsuits against the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority over terrorist attacks that killed and injured Americans.

The justices on Friday unanimously overturned a ruling from a federal appeals court that Congress violated the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee of due process by enacting a 2019 law that expanded the jurisdiction of U.S. courts to hear terrorism-related suits against the PLO and PA.

In an opinion by Chief Justice John Roberts, the high court cited the history of U.S. interaction with the Palestinian entities and the “sensitive foreign policy concerns” behind Congress’ choice to authorize federal courts to hear the terrorism-related cases. Congress’ decision to expand the courts’ jurisdiction in these circumstances does not violate due process-based limits on the reach of U.S. courts, Roberts said.

“It is permissible for the Federal Government to craft a narrow jurisdictional provision that
ensures, as part of a broader foreign policy agenda, that Americans injured or killed by acts of terror have an adequate forum in which to vindicate their right to … compensation” under U.S. law, Roberts wrote.

Roberts insisted the ruling was not a sweeping one signaling that Congress could subject any foreign entity to litigation in the U.S. over any conduct at any time.

The 2019 law, known as the Promoting Security and Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act, does not put the Palestinian entities “at broad risk of being haled into U.S. courts for myriad civil liability actions,” Roberts emphasized. “Rather, the statute applies only to … a narrow category of claims that provide civil remedies only for Americans injured by acts of international terrorism.”

The high court’s decision reinstates lawsuits that were brought on behalf of Americans killed or injured in a 2001 shooting attack in Jerusalem, the bombing of a Hebrew University cafeteria inthat city in 2002, a bus bombing there in 2004 and a stabbing attack outside a shopping center in Gush Etzion, Israel, in 2018.

The suits contend that the PLO and PA’s practice of making payments to the families of Palestinians killed or imprisoned in connection with acts of terrorism encouraged such acts and rendered the PLO and PA financially liable for damages sought by victims and their families.

A PA spokesperson did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on the ruling.

The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in 2023 that Congress’ tweak to the law four years earlier, attempting to give the courts “personal jurisdiction” over the PLO and PA, was unconstitutional.

Roberts’ opinion was fully joined by six other justices — all three of the court’s liberals and three of the conservatives. Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch joined their colleagues in overturning the 2nd Circuit ruling, but adopted different rationales for doing so.

“The Federal Government has always possessed the power to extend its jurisdiction beyond the Nation’s borders,” Thomas wrote in a concurring opinion. Gorsuch joined that portion of Thomas’ concurrence.

In another passage Gorsuch did not join, Thomas went further. “I am skeptical that entities such as the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Palestinian Authority (PA) enjoy any constitutional rights at all,” Thomas wrote.