The US Supreme Court Monday rejected a bid to make the Palestine Liberation Organization pay $655 million in damages to victims of six attacks in Israel. The court's decision aligned with the view of President Donald Trump's administration, which in this case saw no reason for the high court to intervene despite strains in US relations with the PLO.
The court upheld a New York appeals court ruling that in 2016 found that the US courts lacked jurisdiction over attacks in Israel, even though Americans were among the dead and wounded. "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," the PLO's representative in Washington, Husam Zomlot, said in a statement. Zomlot added that the case "should never have been brought to trial in the first place."