Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA) is a law passed by the US Congress, which allows civil lawsuits to be heard in US courts by families of victims of the 9/11 attacks against countries involved in those attacks on US territories. The law has attracted fierce controversy at all levels in Gulf, Arab and Muslim countries. The following is a set of observations in this regard. First of all, the idea of the law is not new. It goes back to 2004, in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, when the Bush administration decided that 28 pages of the 567-page-long report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States should be considered classified government documents. The administration then claimed that releasing the 28 pages "would impair their ability to gather intelligence on suspects of terrorist attacks". This issue sparked a wave of rumors, questions and demands for the declassification of the 28 pages. Later, the Obama administration continued to keep the pages classified, something that led to allegations linking a number of countries, including Saudi Arabia, to the attacks. This prompted Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer and Republican Senator John Cornyn to propose the JASTA bill. The bill passed the Senate without opposition in May 2016, and unanimously passed the House of Representatives two days before the recent 9/11 anniversary. It was then referred to the White House for the approval of President Obama, who utilized his power and vetoed the bill on the grounds that it violated the principle of "State Immunity", which provides countries with government protection against lawsuits in foreign courts. On September 28, 2016, both houses of Congress overruled the veto from the president and passed the bill into law. This was the first override of a presidential veto in Obama's administration. Secondly, while the law does not mention Saudi Arabia and while investigations including the 9/11 Commission report proved its non-involvement, the media has always referred to the missing 28 pages as having evidence linking Saudi Arabia to the 9/11 attacks. The Obama administration decided to release the 28 pages in response to a personal commitment made by the president himself. The pages neither showed anything linking Saudi Arabia to the attacks nor included any proof of the baseless speculations made by Bob Graham, former senator of Florida which only served to stir up public opinion. It is worth pointing out that ever since the 9/11 Commission issued its report in 2004, Saudi Arabia has called for the release of the 28 classified pages, having nothing to fear from the report as the late Prince Saud Al-Faisal repeatedly stated. Thirdly, international concerns with respect to the law essentially arise from the principle of the law itself, as it represents a flagrant violation of "State Immunity", which gives a state the right to protection against being sued in the courts of other states. "State Immunity" is one of the most well-established principles in international law, stipulated in the UN Charter to regulate relations between states. Therefore, the law could mark a dangerous precedent in international relations. Its negative effects may have an impact on the whole world including the United States. The issue will not be restricted to lawsuits by the United States against countries involved in terrorist attacks on US soil; rather, the United States itself will be subject to the same standards. Similar laws will be adopted by other countries, which will allow lawsuits against the United States in foreign courts by any person. Thus, the US government will cause all hell to break loose on itself. Such laws would allow Iraqis and Afghans to sue the United States for all the crimes it has committed since 2001. Nuclear bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, hundreds of thousands of victims killed in Vietnam and crimes in Latin America would all be cited in lawsuits against the US government and other countries. Hence, this law will cause chaos in the framework of international relations. It will stir up a hornet's nest and the United States will be the first to be stung. Fourthly, this law will drive foreign capital and billions of dollars out of the United States for fear of extortion and vulnerability to judicial orders of US courts. The Saudi foreign minister, Adel Al-Jubair, confirmed this in his denial of the misunderstood statements about selling Saudi bonds in the United States saying: "This law will undermine the confidence of investors in the US market; it is not about Saudi Arabia alone". Imagine the loss of trillions of Chinese dollars from the US market. What would happen to the US economy?! It would certainly fall apart. Finally, this law is not realistic. It has political objectives as it is closely tied to the elections and to stirring up public opinion. Terrorism, victims of 9/11 and financial compensation are issues of public sentiment. Even Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders supported the bill. Therefore, it is likely that, the next administration may work against the law for the sake of US homeland security. — Dr. Ibrahim Al-Othaimin is a Middle East affairs specialist and security analyst based in Riyadh. He can be contacted at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @Alothaimin
