Daniel I. Schlesinger, law partner at Jaszczuk PC and lead counsel in a three-decade-long case set to be heard in February 2027, spoke to an August 24 Middle East Forum podcast (video). The following summarizes his comments:
In May 1996, Israeli-American high school student David Boim was waiting at a Jerusalem bus stop to return home from school when two Hamas operatives approached, shot the 17-year-old in the head, and killed him. Schlesinger’s litigation team filed a lawsuit in a Chicago federal court pursuant to the Anti-Terrorism Act which had been enacted the previous month. The Anti-Terrorism Act “allowed us to pursue not just Hamas, the terrorist operation, but anybody who provided material support to Hamas.” At the time, that included the Islamic Association for Palestine organization.
In May 1996, Israeli-American high school student David Boim was waiting at a Jerusalem bus stop to return home from school when two Hamas operatives approached, shot the 17-year-old in the head, and killed him.
In 2004, David’s parents won a $156 million judgment against the Islamic Association for Palestine after it was found guilty of providing material support for Hamas. The Islamic Association for Palestine then went out of business, its assets disappeared, and there was no collection on the judgment. Two years later, the Islamic Association for Palestine formed an “ostensibly” new organization, American Muslims for Palestine, which continued to operate in the same way the Islamic Association for Palestine had. However, it lacked the stigma of the judgment against it, along with any responsibility for Boim’s murder.
In 2017, the Boims filed a new lawsuit against American Muslims for Palestine, alleging that it and related defendants are “alter egos” of the defendants from the Islamic Association for Palestine suit, and therefore liable for the original judgment. The doctrine of alter ego, a Latin phrase that in law refers to “the same organization under a different name,” was cited in the lawsuit but was dismissed by the first federal judge. The dismissal was reversed upon appeal by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.
Alter ego theory is commonly cited in a commercial setting when one company transfers its assets to another company. The second company continues operating but does so in a way as to avoid “a judgment or a debt of the first company.” Commercial application of the theory differs from charitable/not-for-profit organizations because the latter typically do not accumulate assets other than funds contributed by donors that are passed on to further the purposes for which the organization was established.
The lawsuit seeks to establish “the relatively new concept” that alter ego theory can apply in the case of charitable organizations. The difference is that, unlike the case with commercial enterprises, charities should not have to show a transfer of tangible assets. Rather, the transference of intangible assets “like goodwill and operating methods” should be sufficient grounds to hold a non-profit charitable organization like American Muslims for Palestine responsible for the judgment against the Islamic Association for Palestine.
The litigation has been taken to the Court of Appeals in Chicago numerous times and received significant opinions from eminent scholars in the Seventh Circuit. In one case, the judgment was affirmed against the Islamic Association for Palestine, and in a second, the applicability of the concept of alter ego to the Islamic Association for Palestine was affirmed.
Even if the Islamic Association for Palestine did not necessarily give money directly to Hamas, it gave money to other organizations that “in turn, supported Hamas.”
In the first appeal, Judge Posner explained that finances by organizations like the Islamic Association for Palestine and American Muslims for Palestine provided material support to a terrorist organization, namely Hamas. His reasoning was that even if finances were earmarked for non-terrorist activities, it “does not get you off the liability hook” if it is known that the funds support a terrorist organization like Hamas. Despite the hospitals, schools, and charities that Hamas supports, he continued, it is a terror organization, regardless of donor intent.
Even if the Islamic Association for Palestine did not necessarily give money directly to Hamas, it gave money to other organizations that “in turn, supported Hamas.” Judge Posner wrote, “Nor should donors to terrorism be able to escape liability because terrorists and their supporters launder donations thorough a chain of intermediate organizations.” In essence, the “tool of evasion” is ineffective under the Anti-Terrorism Act.
In the second opinion, Judge Scudder addressed the question of the sustainability of the alter ego doctrine in the context of not-for-profits rather than in the context of exclusively commercial enterprises. The judge said that the doctrine’s applicability “take[s] on added weight” when factors such as “overlap in leadership, same organizational purpose, similarity of operations, and unlawful motive or intent to escape liability” are evident.
Judge Scudder amended the complaint that “is our pleading” filed in the Boim case against American Muslims for Palestine. The amended complaint “is replete” with factual allegations that American Muslims for Palestine is “a disguised continuance” of the Islamic Association for Palestine, and in doing so, American Muslims for Palestine had a role in the original “wrongdoing” leading to David Boim’s murder by Hamas. The judge said that if the allegations are proven in February’s trial, the judgment obtained against the Islamic Association for Palestine should be enforceable against American Muslims for Palestine.
American Muslims for Palestine’s chairman, Hatem Bazian, is a senior lecturer in Arabic at the University of California at Berkeley. As a graduate student there, he was responsible for the creation of the first chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine and is the “self-described” leader and major proponent of the Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) movement. Bazian will be on the stand at the trial. If American Muslims for Palestine is found liable, thousands of donors, “some of [whose] names will become known,” would be exposed for helping to support terrorism and kill Americans. The stigma attached to exposure may be sufficient to shame these supporters and weaken their ability to hold positions of responsibility and power. This is particularly of note when considering that people with ties to American Muslims for Palestine are “being elected to public office.”
Another individual named in the lawsuit, Rafiq Jaber, led the Islamic Association for Palestine and was instrumental in American Muslims for Palestine’s work. Jaber had the fiduciary responsibility to collect any the Islamic Association for Palestine’s assets to satisfy the judgment awarded to the Boims in 2004. Because he testified that he did nothing to pursue that end, Jaber is likely to be held liable for breaching his fiduciary duty.
Nihad Awad, another name that will come up at trial, was the Islamic Association for Palestine’s public relations director and was also linked to American Muslims for Palestine management.
Nihad Awad, another name that will come up at trial, was the Islamic Association for Palestine’s public relations director and was also linked to American Muslims for Palestine management. Awad is co-founder and national executive director since 1994 of the Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). A Muslim Brotherhood affiliate in the U.S., CAIR, as well as its sponsorship of American Muslims for Palestine, will also be a focus at the trial.
Although securing a judgment against Hamas is not necessarily the point of the case, obtaining judgments and monies from people who provide material support to Hamas is “another effective way of combatting terrorism.” Although the Anti-Terrorism Act was controversial when it was enacted, the Boim case established the precedent. That precedent, which will be reinforced as the trial approaches, is that the extension of federal courts’ jurisdiction to activities outside the U.S. is enforceable and constitutional. Consequently, in global cases brought by countless individuals harmed by Hamas, the precedent established by the Boim case will enable these individuals to pursue similar recoveries. The case says that if all it takes to avoid accountability and liability is “to move down the street and change your name,” then the Anti-Terrorism Act itself is left “emasculated” and its influence meaningless.
