Times change, the wheel of the moral universe bends toward justice, and yet one thing that has remained true for as long as I have been alive is that blatant displays of prejudice, bigotry, and racism have always been openly allowed in America – as long as they were targeted at Arabs and/or Muslims. This sad and irreversible fact was on full display last year during Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral campaign, and say the quiet part out loud The reaction to Abdul el-Sayed’s current Senate race has somehow managed to get even worse on both sides of the aisle (Democrats have lamented that he “doesn’t share our values,” while Republicans outright called the guy a jihadist). But anyone who remembers 9/11 knows it didn’t start with people like Vicky PaladinoAs I assume anyone who remembers the murder of Alex Odeh knows, it did not start with 9/11.
Alexander Mitchell Odeh, serving as the West Coast regional director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), was the only person killed by a bomb planted in his California office on the morning of October 11, 1985, leaving behind his wife Norma and their three young daughters, Helena, Samya, and Susan. To this day, his murder remains “unsolved”. And yet, Jason Osder and William Youmans’ scattered but important documentary “Who Killed Alex Odeh?” It becomes clear as soon as it begins, there is no doubt who was behind the murder.
In fact, the film establishes that the case was effectively solved within days of the attack, and that all three primary suspects – all members of the right-wing terrorist group known as the Jewish Defense League – were allowed to flee to Israel only because powerful forces within the American political system preferred them to stay away from it. And get away from it. And get away from it. More than 40 years later, no efforts have been made to prosecute or extradite the alleged killers. One of them has even gone back to the United States.
And so, despite affecting aesthetics and the ups and downs of the true-crime format, “Who Killed Alex Odeh?” This directly contradicts the expectations of its stated genre. Rather than set up a grand mystery for their film to explore, Osder and Youmans — one of them Jewish, the other Palestinian-American — shape the adventure. absence Of one. While stunting and exploring by design, his film highlights the socio-political context of Odeh’s murder to demonstrate how the Google-able question raised by its title could possibly remain “unanswered” for so long, and even participates in some light subterfuge as part of an effort to catch the perpetrators on camera.
What the documentary discovers, or at least draws new attention to, is by turns eye-opening, revealing, and eye-opening. For Its clarity. First and foremost, Osder and Youmans use Odeh’s assassination as a lens through which to examine the militarization of Jewish extremism at home and abroad (with an emphasis on the emergence of ultra-nationalist JDL founder Meir Kahane). Driven by archival footage, the film leaves little room for personal reflection, but its focus is deliberately myopic given the extent to which “terrorism” has long been defined as an exclusively Muslim practice; Osder suggests in press notes, but not in the documentary, that American Jews are rarely taught about the more violent manifestations of Zionism, an implication supported by my own memories of going to Hebrew school at an Orthodox New England synagogue.
“Who killed Alex Odeh?”. It also examines how tacit permission for such violence allows it to occur. Israel welcomed Odeh’s alleged killers back to the Holy Land, and President Reagan’s refusal to recognize the gravity of a hate crime committed against a fellow American on American soil (he never sent a letter of condolence to Odeh’s widow), sent a clear and lasting message that the world’s most powerful governments were fine with the shedding of Palestinian blood. It has since been alleged that the Mossad and the US State Department colluded to close down the investigation into the assassination.
In the film’s most chilling scene, which has little use for suspense, Israeli investigative journalist David Sheen disguises himself as an ultra-Orthodox Jew and meets one of the alleged killers while wearing a hidden camera – Baruch Ben-Yosef’s outspoken prejudices do not seem detracting from his comfortable position as a pillar of his community. Later, when Osder lured him into a sit-down interview under false pretenses, Ben-Yosef excused himself from the conversation when Odeh’s name was mentioned, asking “This again?” The attitude of someone who seems to believe that no one can possibly tell anything yet about the murder of a single Palestinian migrant in 1985.
The film’s erratic attempts to contextualize this constantly metastasizing disease fall somewhat short of Odeh himself. Born in Palestine but displaced to Egypt during his childhood due to the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, the noble but mild-mannered Odeh dedicated his adult life to combating discrimination against his people in America. Home video footage and old clips of his appearances at television panels portray Odeh as more of an egomaniac than a flamboyant one. He worked to make inroads with the local Jewish community, and had no public profile other than occasional appearances on “Newsline”. During his last appearance on the show, he argued with a member of JDL.
Osder and Youmans also interviewed Odeh’s immediate family members, whose “what else is there to say other than the obvious?” This has already been absorbed in the rest of the documentary. A different and possibly more rewarding film could have done more to examine the pain of living in a country that has signed off on the hate-based murder of your husband or father, but “Who Killed Alex Odeh?” There is some patience for investigation. The only thing more glaring than the identity of Odeh’s killers is the continued lack of political will to hold them accountable. And a country that lacks the political will to address the slaughter of a Palestinian is a country that lacks the political will to address the slaughter of Palestinians themselves.
grade B
“Who killed Alex Odeh?”. Now running in theatres.