Friday, March 18, 2022
Elder of Ziyon
Rasmea Odeh is the convicted Palestinian terrorist who is the darling of modern antisemites (who claim they are merely anti-Zionist.)
Not surprisingly to those of us who have followed the cases, Lubet shows that she is guilty on all counts.
Here is a summary of the summary:
First, Odeh was guilty of the crime to which she pleaded guilty: “procuring citizenship contrary to law.” She falsely denied, in writing and in person, being arrested, convicted, and jailed in Israel. That lie, without which she would not have obtained citizenship, was illegal. After her grudging plea was accepted, Odeh rushed to the courthouse steps to take it back in the presence of her fans. But Lubet shows that Odeh pleaded out for a good reason, namely, the weakness of her defense.At trial, Odeh claimed that she misread her naturalization application, which asked such unambiguous questions as “Have you EVER been convicted of any crime or offense.” That boldfaced, capitalized “ever,” she said, referred only to convictions in the United States, she had thought. The official who conducted her naturalization interview testified to having clarified, as a routine practice, that the word “ever” included “anywhere in the world.” Odeh asserted that the official never did so, which is why she reaffirmed, under oath and line by line, the lies in her application.
Lubet then demolishes the claims that Odeh didn't know enough English in her 1994 visa application where she wrote the same lie (she took English in school and college materials were in English) and that her supposed PTSD didn't allow her to admit to being arrested (she clearly talks about her arrest all the time.)
Lubet then proves that the accusation that the judges were biased are completely unfounded; and he impressively shows how they bent over backwards to allow her defense.
Then:
Rasmea Odeh was guilty of the crimes she lied about, including her participation in the operation that killed Edward Joffe and Leon Kanner. Lubet counts the ways in which this should be ob-vious. Both of the women who worked with Odeh and planted the bombs have implicated her in the operation, not under duress but during interviews with friendly interlocutors. In one such interview, Odeh herself sits, smiling and denying nothing, as her accomplice thanks her for “dragging [her] into military work.” After Odeh went to prison, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) named a hijacking unit after her and made her release a high priority. Odeh, who portrayed herself to “European and American audiences” as an innocent victim caught up in an Israeli dragnet, told a sympathetic interviewer that she was a member of PFLP’s central committee, and she gave several “Arabic-language television interviews recounting her involvement in ‘military work,’” a euphemism for the PFLP’s attacks on civilians. And why not? Before she came to the United States, Odeh was celebrated in the Arab world.
Lubet finds it credible that Odeh was tortured; Israeli laws against that weren't solidified for years afterwards. But if she admitted anything under torture, it was the truth.
The people who demanded "justice for Rasmea" got exactly what they asked for.
