Convicted terrorist Rasmea Yousef Odeh has plead "not guilty"

Convicted terrorist Rasmea Yousef Odeh has plead not guilty in her first court appearance in Detroit on charges of immigration fraud. She is accused of failing to tell U.S. immigration authorities about her role in a deadly bombing in Israel.   If Odeh is convicted, her U.S. citizenship could be stripped, and she could serve up to 10 years in prison.

She became a naturalized United States citizen in 2004 and is now charged with covering up her conviction in an attack that killed two people at a Jerusalem market in 1969.  Two people were killed when Odeh and other PFLP members bombed a crowded Jerusalem supermarket on Feb. 21, 1969.  A second bombing four days later at the British Consulate was unsuccessful.

Odeh now lives in the Chicago area, but the case is filed in Detroit federal court because that's where the 66-year-old gained U.S. citizenship. She falsely told immigration officials she'd lived in Jordan all her life, prosecutors allege.

Odeh is the associate director at the Chicago based Arab American Action Network. She was released on bond and declined further comment.

Odeh's supporters marched outside the courthouse with signs that said "Stop anti-Arab racism." 

In Oakland, a local call for action by the  Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), the Palestinian Youth Movement(PYM), and the International Jewish anti-Zionist Network (IJAN)  and endorsed by the Middle East Children's Alliance, Bay Area Committee to Stop Political Repression, National Lawyer's Guild-San Francisco and the Freedom Archive attracted 6 participants.

Oakland rally in support of convicted terrorist RasmeaYousef Odeh attracts 6 participants