The mother of a West Bank man who invited a 16-year-old American to the Mideast to get married says she is distraught that the teenager has returned home and hopes to bring the couple together.

Sana Jinzawi says she was waiting at the airport in Tel Aviv to pick up Katherine Lester, who met her 20-year-old son Abdullah on the popular MySpace.com Web site.

Lester had boarded a flight to Israel last week after slipping out of her mother’s house in Gilford, Mich. But U.S. authorities intercepted her at a stopover in Amman, Jordan, on Friday, seized her passport and put her on a flight home.

Sana Jinzawi said by telephone from her West Bank home in Jericho Wednesday that her son was heartbroken and insisted the two are in love.

“She was going to sign a marriage contract as soon as she got here,” the mother said, adding she told Lester to “bring a pink dress for the engagement party and a white dress for the wedding.”

“She wanted to convert to Islam and wear the head covering and live with us and adopt our culture,” Sana Jinzawi said.

Renee Wood, an attorney for Lester’s mother, Shawn, said she had not heard of a marriage contract, but “we did hear that she was to marry him.”

Telephone messages seeking comment from Lester’s parents were not returned Wednesday.