Palestinian Americans trapped in Gaza sue Biden administration

A group of Palestinian Americans, either trapped in Gaza or those that have relatives there, have filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration, accusing it of abandoning Americans of Palestinian origin during the ongoing Israeli war on the enclave.
The lawsuit, filed by nine Palestinian Americans with support from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (Cair) and the law office of Maria Kari, states that the US government failed to implement standard efforts to evacuate Americans and their families from Gaza.
The plaintiffs say they tried for months to use all non-legal means to either escape Gaza themselves or help their immediate family members escape.
According to Cair, each of the plaintiffs is eligible to be evacuated by the US, but they have been "summarily ignored by the State Department and other Biden administration officials".
“The law requires the US government to protect Americans wherever they may be. With every passing day, the danger of our clients dying from Israeli bombardment or the starvation and disease now rampant in Gaza only goes up,” said lead attorney Maria Kari.
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In February, Middle East Eye reported on the labyrinthine process that Palestinian Americans trapped in Gaza must go through to be able to secure US evacuation.
The first step involves relatives of trapped individuals applying to the State Department on their behalf using an online crisis intake form.
If the State Department approves the form, it adds the individuals' names to a list that gets sent to Egypt and Israel for further review.
Once the review is approved, the list is sent over to Palestinian authorities in Gaza, who publish a daily list of individuals cleared to leave via the Rafah border crossing.
The State Department told MEE at the time that it had successfully helped more than 1,600 Palestinians - "including US citizens, lawful permanent residents (LPRs) and their family members" - leave Gaza and enter Egypt via the Rafah crossing.
However, the process only helped Palestinian Americans and their families escape if they met very specific criteria.
At the time of MEE's reporting, only US citizens, their spouses, parents and unmarried children under the age of 21 were permitted by Washington to leave Gaza.
Siblings under the age of 21 could also be approved to leave, but only if their US-citizen sibling was also under 21, according to Sammy Nabulsi, a lawyer working on these cases.
Nabulsi said he has been working with dozens of families who have relatives stuck in Gaza - brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews - and are not eligible to leave Gaza due to the conditions set by the US government.
The situation worsened with Israel’s invasion of Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city, which includes the crossing with Egypt that the US was using to evacuate Americans.
Cair said the State Department cited the closure of Rafah as the "ostensible reason for its failure to help Palestinian Americans in Gaza". However, the rights group noted that evacuations could still be conducted via the Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing, which leads into Israel.
“My own family has suffered the devastating consequences of the State Department’s inaction,” Yasmeen Elagha, an attorney working on this case, said in a statement.
“The State Department must act to evacuate our clients now before another soul is lost.”
This marks the second time this week that a group of Palestinian Americans has filed a lawsuit against the US government related to Israel's war on Gaza.
On Tuesday, a group of Palestinians living both in the US and Gaza filed a lawsuit against US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, saying that Washington has failed to comply with a law prohibiting the US from sending aid to foreign militaries that have conducted grave human rights violations.
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