Bilal Abdul Kareem v. Gina Haspel, 986 F.3d 859

Plaintiff Bilal Abdul Kareem, a U.S. citizen and journalist working in Syria, alleges five near-miss aerial strikes occurred in his vicinity in summer 2016.
Kareem claims those incidents make it plausible his name was put on a U.S. list of terrorist targets (the "Kill List") and that he was never notified or given process.
He sued federal agencies and officials (CIA, DOD, DHS, DOJ, DNI, etc.) under the APA and the Constitution seeking declaratory and injunctive relief (removal from list, notice, process).
The district court initially found Kareem had plausibly alleged standing, dismissed some counts as non-justiciable political questions, and allowed others to proceed; later the court dismissed the complaint under the state secrets privilege.
On appeal the D.C. Circuit reviewed standing de novo, concluded the complaint failed to plead facts plausibly showing the strikes were attributable to the United States or specifically targeted Kareem, and vacated/remanded to dismiss for lack of Article III standing.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Article III standing to seek prospective relief	Proximity to five strikes and journalistic contacts with rebels make it plausible U.S. targeted Kareem and placed him on the Kill List	Complaint lacks factual allegations plausibly linking the strikes to the U.S. or showing Kareem was a specific target	Allegations are conclusory and implausible; Kareem lacks Article III standing; case must be dismissed
State secrets privilege — whether it required dismissal	Privilege cannot foreclose Kareem's Fifth Amendment due-process claims	Disclosure would threaten national security, intelligence sources/methods, and military operations	Appellate court did not resolve this issue because Kareem lacks standing; district court's state-secrets dismissal vacated
Political-question doctrine / justiciability	Some constitutional claims (due process, First/ Fourth/ Fifth Amendment effects) are justiciable	Many claims implicate sensitive foreign-affairs/intelligence judgments and are political questions	Appellate court did not reach; district court had earlier split counts (some non-justiciable, some justiciable) but standing resolved the appeal

Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (pleading standard — legal conclusions vs. plausible factual allegations)
Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (plausibility standard for pleadings)
Clapper v. Amnesty Int’l USA, 568 U.S. 398 (standing requires certainly impending injury; rigorous review for foreign-intelligence claims)
Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555 (Article III standing framework)
Arpaio v. Obama, 797 F.3d 11 (D.C. Cir.) (prospective relief requires certainly impending injury standard)
Atherton v. D.C. Office of Mayor, 567 F.3d 672 (D.C. Cir.) (pleading must permit inference more than mere possibility)
Mohamed v. Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc., 614 F.3d 1070 (9th Cir.) (state secrets can require dismissal when litigation would unreasonably risk disclosure)
Simon v. E. Ky. Welfare Rts. Org., 426 U.S. 26 (limits of federal-court jurisdiction to actual cases or controversies)