U.S. authorities have filed criminal charges against a divorced Palestinian father who took his three children from Kansas to live in his native Gaza in an alleged violation of his custody decree.

Bethany Gonzales wants her children back in America. The divorced Muslim parents lived in suburban Kansas City until Ahmed Abuhamda took their children to Gaza in February.

He was charged in a federal criminal complaint filed last week in U.S. District Court in Kansas with intent to avoid prosecution on three state felony counts charging him with aggravated interference with parental custody.

The mother says she signed off on passports so the children could attend a wedding and that the father indicated he would bring them back. The father says she knew he was moving them to Gaza.