Sonia Sotomayor refuses to pause $655M judgment against Palestinian Authority over attack claims
US Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor on Tuesday declined to pause a $655.5 million judgment against the Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization over attacks that killed and wounded Americans in Israel during the Second Intifada.
Sotomayor rejected the request without providing an explanation and without sending it to the full court. The decision allows efforts to collect the money to continue while the PA and PLO prepare another appeal, but it does not mean the Supreme Court has ruled on that appeal itself.
The Palestinian organizations had asked the court to freeze the judgment, arguing that it should not have been revived after previously being overturned. They also warned that collecting the award now could deepen the PA’s financial crisis and disrupt schools, hospitals, sanitation and security services in the West Bank.
The case was brought by American victims and relatives of victims of shootings and bombings in and around Jerusalem between 2002 and 2004. A New York jury ruled in their favor in 2015 and awarded $218.5 million in damages, which was tripled under US anti-terrorism law to $655.5 million.
That judgment was overturned in 2016 after an appeals court found that the US courts did not have the authority at the time to hear the case against the PA and PLO. Congress later changed the law to make it easier for American victims of terrorism to bring such cases.
The Supreme Court unanimously upheld that law in 2025, and the appeals court reinstated the original judgment in March. The PA and PLO are now expected to ask the Supreme Court to decide whether a judgment that had already been overturned could legally be brought back years later.
