A Lebanese-Australian woman left destitute after a failed marriage has been ordered to return to the US with her two sons despite the Family Court accepting her claims that her Lebanese-American husband planned to take the boys to Lebanon, where they would "join Hezbollah and die like real men".

The court accepted that "Maryam" came to stay with her parents in Australia last year after her husband "Adam", who took a second wife under Islamic law, told Maryam to "go to Australia, your parents can take care of you and your kids . . . you can all go to hell and get out of my life".But it said the fact Adam later filed an international child abduction claim meant he had told Maryam to go to Australia "in anger" and did not give her consent to remove the children from the US.A Family Court judge, sitting in Sydney, found that Maryam wrongfully removed the children and ordered she return them to the US, where she and Adam will share joint custody. The judge said strict conditions imposed on Adam would reduce the "grave risk" of harm to the boys, aged 12 and seven.

First cousins Adam and Maryam married in an Islamic ceremony in Australia when she was 15 and he was 24. Two years later, the couple moved to the US, where Adam is a resident, and married in a civil ceremony.