Funding Evil: How Terrorism is Financed and How to Stop It is a book written by counterterrorism researcher Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, director of the American Center for Democracy and the Economic Warfare Institute.

Ehrenfeld asserts that "it was bin Laden who managed the drug profits for the Taliban and arranged money-laundering operations with the Russian Mafiya."

William B. Scott wrote in Aviation Week & Space Technology that the book is "brutally bipartisan and international in its bare-knuckled explanations of how political power and corporate greed have emboldened and strengthened the likes of Osama bin Laden and Yasar Arafat, while allowing future terrorists to be recruited and trained."

He added that under English law, the defendants had the opportunity to counter the suit by attempting to "prove, on the balance of probabilities, that the defamatory allegations were substantially true".

Mahfouz's English lawyer argued that "Our clients have brought proceedings in England because they maintain residences, transact business and have reputations to protect in this jurisdiction.

"[4] In addition, she asserted that she had not properly been served notice and lacked the financial resources to fight bin Mafouz's lawsuit in England.

Mahfouz sought to have the New York case dismissed, claiming that the court had no jurisdiction over him and no power to rule in the issues raised by Ehrenfeld.

[4] Judge Richard C. Casey found in his favour and dismissed the case in April 2006, ruling that the court lacked personal jurisdiction over Mahfouz under New York state law.

Ehrenfeld's appeal was again supported by many media organisations in a consolidated amicus curiae brief, which argued that the "growing and dangerous threat of 'libel tourism' – the cynical and aggressive use of claimant-friendly libel laws in foreign jurisdictions ... has chilled and will continue to chill Dr Ehrenfeld's exercise of her free speech".

[14] As of July 2010, six other states have passed analogs to Rachel's Law: Illinois,[15] Florida,[16] California,[17] Tennessee,[18] Maryland,[19] and Utah.

Like Rachel's law, the SPEECH Act declares foreign libel judgments to be unenforceable in the US unless they meet the criteria set forth by the First Amendment.