Parents of U.S. teen killed by Hamas to sue

Palestinian charity denies terror link

More than two decades after their son was killed by Hamas in Israel, an American couple will file suit Friday in their relentless effort to crush groups that fund terror.

But the chairman and founder of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), the target of the litigation, denies the group has anything to do with terrorism and calls the claim “Islamophobia.”

David Boim was a 17-year-old yeshiva student when he was fatally shot at a West Bank bus stop in May 1996. Four years later, the family sued a group of U.S.-based Palestinian charities linked to Hamas, claiming they could be held responsible for Boim’s death under federal antiterror laws.

In 2004, Stanley and Joyce Boim won a $156 million judgment that was upheld by a federal appeals court in 2008.

The organizations had argued that they didn’t support the military wing of Hamas, that they simply funded aid groups operating in the West Bank. But the court ruling affirmed the principle that those who fund terror groups are responsible under U.S. law for the actions of those groups — even if the donors contend they only intended to support humanitarian activities.

Joyce Boim says the court battles are more about justice than money.

“We think about and mourn our son David every day,” Boim, who lives in Jerusalem, said in an email Thursday. “We brought the original suit to prevent other American families from suffering similar tragedies. We pray that this new effort will give more force to the law that seeks justice for terror victims.”

“We said ‘If you support those groups, you support the military wing,’ ” Stephen Landis, a lawyer for the Boims, tells USA TODAY. He called the court ruling a “landmark decision” for the AntiTerrorism Act of 1992, which gave U.S. civil courts jurisdiction when Americans are harmed by international terrorism.

Landis says the couple collected pennies on the dollar from the groups but was satisfied they forced them to shut down.

“Their motivation was not to get rich,” Landis said. “They just don’t want another penny to go to the types of organizations that killed their son.”

Landis says the groups claimed they couldn’t afford to pay the judgment and closed up shop. Landis says AMP and its fiscal sponsor, Americans for Justice in Palestine Educational Foundation, are “alter egos” of the defunct groups and should be held liable for the unpaid judgment. He also claims that three AMP officials were once members of the previously sued Hamas-linked charities.

“They moved down the street and put a new name on the door,” he says.

AMP, founded in 2006, says on its website that it was founded by Americans to educate the American public and media about issues related to Palestine and its heritage. AMP Chairman Hatem Bazian says his group has no connection to Hamas and does no work outside the U.S.

“We are here to educate, to inform and to engage the American public and lawmakers on why the policy in Palestine should consider the Palestinian perspective,” he told USA TODAY. “This lawsuit is frivolous and highly Islamophobic.”

“We think about and mourn our son David every day.” Joyce Boim