Leon Klinghoffer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Jump to: navigation, search

Leon Klinghoffer (September 24, 1916October 8, 1985) was a retired appliance manufacturer from New York who was disabled (from a stroke) and used a wheelchair for mobility. Leon was killed by Palestinian terrorists who hijacked the cruise ship Achille Lauro.

Leon and Marilyn Klinghoffer, both Jewish-Americans, were celebrating their 36th wedding anniversary in 1985 by taking a cruise aboard the Achille Lauro. On the afternoon of October 8, 1985, four Palestinian terrorists who had hijacked the ship, shot Leon Klinghoffer while he was sitting in his wheelchair. The terrorists then threw him and his wheelchair overboard, while he was still alive as his wife watched in horror.

The body was recovered from the sea and Leon Klinghoffer was buried at Beth David Memorial Park in Kenilworth, New Jersey. Four months after Leon Klinghoffer's murder, Marilyn Klinghoffer died of colon cancer. Leon and Marilyn Klinghoffer were survived by their daughters, Ilsa and Lisa Klinghoffer.

After his death, his daughter's established the Leon and Marilyn Klinghoffer Memorial Foundation with the Anti-Defamation League; the foundation combats terrorism through educational, political and legal means. The foundation is funded by undisclosed settlement paid by the PLO to the Klinghoffers to settle a lawsuit seeking damages for the PLO's role in the hijacking. (Klinghoffer v. PLO, 739 F. Supp. 854 (S.D.N.Y. 1990) and Klinghoffer v. PLO, 937 F.2d 44, 50 (2d Cir. 1991) ). This lawsuit spurred passage of the Antiterrorism Act of 1990 which made it easier for victims of terrorism to sue terrorists and collect civil damages for losses incurred.

The hijacking was made into a television movie in 1990, Voyage of Terror – The Achille Lauro Affair starring Burt Lancaster and Eve Marie Saint. John Coolidge Adams' second opera, The Death of Klinghoffer, with a libretto by Alice Goodman, opened to great controversy in 1991. The concept for the opera was suggested by director Peter Sellars. The Los Angeles Opera shared in the works' commission but never presented it.

External links

Personal tools
In other languages