Convicted Terrorist Doesn't Want the Word 'Terrorism' Used In Upcoming Trial

By Lorraine Swanson | Patch Editor (Patch Staff)

Caption: Rasmeih Yousef Odeh as she appeared in the 2007 film documentary, “Women In Struggle.”

The Evergreen Park woman arrested a year ago on charges that she hid a terror conviction in Israel in order to gain U.S. citizenship doesn’t want the word “terrorism” used in her upcoming immigration fraud trial.

Pretrial arguments were heard Tuesday in a federal courtroom in Detroit for Rasmieh Yousef Odeh, 66, whose trial is set for Nov. 4.

Odeh, 66, was taken from her Evergreen Park home by FBI agents on Oct. 22, 2013, after she allegedly lied about her role in a deadly supermarket bombing in Jerusalem in 1969, and two others.

According to the federal indictment, two people were killed in the supermarket bombing, while the British Consulate sustained structural damage in a second bomb plot a few weeks later.

After being convicted by an Israeli military court the next year, Odeh spent the next decade in an Israeli prison until her release in a prison swap the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine terrorist organization, according to the federal indictment.

Odeh immigrated to the United States in 1995 and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2004, after answering “no” to a series of questions about her past arrest, conviction and imprisonment for the Jerusalem bombings, federal authorities allege.

An expert on treating war survivors and torture victims told a federal judge on Tuesday that there is a strong possibility that Odeh suffers from chronic post traumatic stress disorder, the Detroit Free Press reported.

Her attorney, Michael Deutsch, claims that Odeh was tortured by the Israelis into confessing to the 1969 bombings and still bears those emotional scars, the paper said.

U.S. District Judge Gershwin Drain also heard arguments on whether to allow testimony on Odeh’s mental state and whether jurors can hear the word “terrorism.” The Detroit Free Press said the judge did not make any immediate decisions.

Authorities were unaware of Odeh’s conviction, who was a highly visible community activist in the Arab American community up until her arrest one year ago. She was the subject of a 2007 documentary called “Women In Struggle,” in which she and other female subjects alleged they were raped, beaten and tortured by the Israelis into giving up information about the Palestinian Liberation Front.

During the film’s showing in 2007 at a Palestinian film festival in Chicago, Odeh was a guest in the audience. In the film, she remained unrepentant about her actions.

She is currently an associate director on the Arab American Action Network in Chicago and worked as an Obamacare navigator in Illinois.

Odeh has pled not guilty to immigration fraud charges in November 2012. If convicted, she faces ten years in a U.S. prison followed by deportation.