Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Life

Terror Victim’s Niece Condemns Women’s Strike For Including Convicted Killer In Leadership

(JTA) — The niece of an Israeli killed in a terrorist attack nearly 50 years ago criticized the planned March 8 International Women’s Strike for allowing into a leadership role one of the convicted terrorists that killed her uncle.

“What justification is there for Rasmea Odeh, a woman who killed two people (with the intention of killing more!) to lead a peaceful fight for human rights?” Benaryeh writes.

Eddie Joffe and Leon Kanner were killed at the Supersol market in Jerusalem on Feb. 21. 1969, when a bomb set by Odeh and an accomplice exploded in the crowded store. Nine people were injured in the blast.

Odeh was convicted and sentenced by an Israeli military court in 1970 to life in prison for two bombing attacks. She spent 10 years in an Israeli prison before being released in a prisoner exchange in 1980.

Odeh confessed to planting the bomb, though in recent years has claimed that the confession was tortured out of her, which is disputed by Israeli officials.

Odeh, an associate director at the Arab American Action Network, was found guilty in November 2014 of lying on her application for citizenship to the United States by covering up her conviction and imprisonment for the bombing attacks.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.