An Israeli man who couldn’t find work here is suing his wife, saying she abducted their son and is keeping him at her parents’ home in Queens.
Avi Halaf’s lawsuit says he flew to the Big Apple in January to find work, but was stymied because he doesn’t speak English. So the construction engineer asked his wife, Ayelet Bason Halaf, to book him a return flight to the Holy Land, where she had stayed behind with their year-old son.
But instead, Ayelet, an El Al Airlines employee, brought their toddler, Tohar, to America and moved with the child into her family’s basement apartment in Forest Hills, according to Avi’s suit in Manhattan federal court.
Avi says his wife “unilaterally decided to permanently remain in the United States” and “told me that she no longer wanted to be married to me.”
His suit invokes the Hague Convention on international child abduction to force the return of his son to Israel.
There was no answer yesterday at the phone number listed for the Forest Hills apartment.