Daniel Pipes has an intriguing idea for the victims of 9/11: Sue the Saudis.

The fact that Saudi ideology, nationals and money play so large a role in the attacks has two important implications.

First, the Saudis’ own legal code is largely based on the compensating the injured party. (Hit a camel with your car and you pay compensation to the camel’s owner; hit the camel’s owner and you pay his family.) Saudi laws and traditions, in other words, require that the families of those harmed on Sept. 11 be paid. You have a strong moral claim on the Saudis.

Second, you also have a good legal basis to demand payment from the kingdom in a U.S. court. “Although it is generally assumed that U.S. citizens can only sue governments that the State Department officially deems to be sponsors of terrorism,” says Allan Gerson, an international law expert and author of the just-published “Price of Terror” (HarperCollins), “that’s just not true.”