Finally, after a lengthy quest for justice spanning nearly four years, a U.S. court has ruled in favor of the family of a Lebanese American man who was held captive in Lebanon. The court determined that the Islamic Republic of Iran, working in collaboration with its proxy Hezbollah, should be held accountable for the abduction and abuse of their father.
Amer Fakhoury’s two daughters, Guila and Zoya Fakhoury, revealed to Fox News Digital that on May 1, a U.S. District Court judge held Iran responsible for their father’s captivity.
“This is the first lawsuit to prove Iran’s influence over Lebanon,” Guila said. “We were very happy about the judgment.”
Establishing Iran’s involvement in the captivity proved to be a challenging task. While some individuals dismissed the family’s accusations against Iran regarding their father’s mistreatment, Zoya pointed out that “Iran’s growing influence in Lebanon in recent times serves as further evidence supporting our claims.”
Because Iran never responded to the suit, Guila said the family was forced to provide evidence her father witnessed of Hezbollah’s control over “every government agency in Lebanon,” including the military hospital, military court, and the Lebanese General Directorate of General Security, the country’s intelligence apparatus that Guila said arrested and tortured Fakhoury.
In Beirut, an arch glorifying Hezbollah and Iran’s leader Ali Khamenei, and people gather outside a hospital after the arrival of several men wounded by exploding handheld pagers, in Beirut. (Anwar Amro/AFP via Getty Images | AP Photo/Bassam Masri)
Even when the Lebanese judicial system found Fakhoury innocent of multiple false charges that he was a killer, a terrorist and an Israeli agent, Guila said officials told Fakhoury that they had to keep him “because Hezbollah wants [him] in prison.”
Fakhoury’s family faced difficulties even before filing their case in May 2021. Zoya says Hezbollah officials in Lebanon have been issuing threats to the family since Fakhoury’s death. In addition to Iran failing to respond to the suit, Guila said Lebanese General Directorate of General Security officials interfered with the lawsuit by asking to have their names and agencies removed. She says the judge denied the request.
Long periods of silence from the court also made the wait for justice difficult, Zoya said. “The last four years, we were fearful,” she explained. “We were worried maybe nothing’s going to come out of this.”
While the family is grateful for the judgment they received, Guila says they believe the settlement awarded through the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act was “a bit of an unfair decision” and did not “take into account the pain and the suffering of the family.”
Amer Fakhoury and his family during Christmas 2018. (Courtesy of the Fakhoury family)
Still, the landmark judgment paves the way for others to find justice, the family says. “We’re hoping, with this administration, to use the judgment that we have and the work that we’ve been doing in the [Amer] Foundation to continue the accountability efforts,” Guila said. “A lot of other Lebanese citizens [and] American citizens that have been targeted by the Lebanese government, by Hezbollah in Lebanon, can now use this case to get justice for what happened to them,” Zoya explained.
The sisters said the next steps in their journey are to find justice for their father and will involve requesting the State Department to sanction “officials in Lebanon who were traitors and working with Hezbollah and Iran.”
