COLUMN: A more effective way to fight terrorism

From Mike Silver's, "Master of My Domain," Fall '98 From Mike Silver's, "Master of My Domain," Fall '98T errorism -- a phenomena that once seemed confined to the Middle East -- has in recent years shred our nation's aura of invincibility. The first chink in our armor was the Pan Am Flight 103 tragedy of 1988, which proved that terrorism could affect American citizens abroad. The World Trade Center bombing in 1993 proved that our own cities could be the target of international terrorists. And the Oklahoma City tragedy shattered the myth that terrorism was an exclusively external force. And out of this change in attitude have come new -- potentially quite effective -- ideas about how to deter terrorism. Specifically, recent legislation targets the pocketbooks of governments that back terrorists. Thus, the legislation attacks the root of the problem, not the symptoms, as tightening airport security and jailing suspected terrorists attempts to do. A 1996 anti-terrorism bill passed by Congress allows U.S. citizens to file suit in U.S. courts against countries that have been designated sponsors of terrorism. A 1997 amendment to the bill, sponsored by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D.-N.J.), allows the families to sue the sovereign foreign countries for punitive damages. Passage of the bill was influenced by the Flatow family of West Orange, N.J. After Alisa Flatow, a 20-year-old Brandeis University student studying abroad in Israel, was among eight people killed by a suicide bomber in the Gaza Strip in April 1995, her family members channeled their despair in a positive direction and began to vociferously speak out against terrorism. The family reaped the benefits of its own lobbying efforts earlier this month when a U.S. District Court judge ordered the government of Iran to pay the Flatows a staggering $247.5 million in damages for its role in the bombing. According to the judge, expert testimony successfully proved that the Iranian government had provided funds for the Islamic Jihad -- the Palestinian extremist group that took responsibility for the attack. The ruling raised the hopes of the families of victims who died in the Pan Am Flight 103 crash in 1998. Although these families were the first to file suit under the new law, their $202 billion suit has languished in the courts because the Libyan government immediately challenged its constitutionality. Widespread debate abounds as to whether families like the Flatows will actually be able to collect the money. Representatives of the Iranian government never even showed up to the trial to offer a defense. In fact, Iran plans to ignore the decision, which they called "politically motivated" and "irresponsible in nature." And several experts on international law could not recall an example when an individual seized assets of a sovereign state outside their own country. Lawyers for the Flatows, on the other hand, said they will attempt to collect Iranian assets held in foreign countries or assets already frozen in the U.S. Steven Perles, one of the Flatow's lawyers, is not new to cases like this; he represented Hugo Princz, a Holocaust survivor who successfully fought for reparations from the German government. It is likely that the Iranian government will be forced to pay at least some of the damages. And since money talks, the government may now think twice about sanctioning terrorist activities. Allowing victims to sue a foreign country for punitive damages succeeds where diplomacy fails. Application of this law takes terrorism out of the purely political arena and introduces the human element. It places individuals on the same level as nations and gives legitimacy to their struggles. Madeleine Albright could negotiate treaties and expound statistics, but she can't properly articulate the hurt that terrorism inflicts on innocent families like the Flatows. Families of victims now have a legitimate shot at confronting their adversaries and achieving some much-needed catharsis.