Terrorism Case Over West Bank Attack Thrown Out in Novel Ruling

The Palestinian Authority dodged civil litigation by the family of an American killed during a terrorist attack on a Jewish settlement in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, when a federal judge in Manhattan ruled that the governing body isn’t subject to the jurisdiction of U.S. courts.

Judge Jesse M. Furman dismissed the case late Thursday with a novel ruling for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, striking down portions of a federal law that states Palestinian leadership groups are “deemed to have consented” to jurisdiction in some terrorism cases.

Furman, confronting an issue of first impression, ...