[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 171 (Thursday, September 30, 2021)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1054]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         IN MEMORY OF ALEX ODEH

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. J. LUIS CORREA

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, September 30, 2021

  Mr. CORREA. Madam Speaker, today I rise to remember October 11th the 
day that Alex Odeh was assassinated 36 years ago. This somber 
anniversary is a stark reminder that his killers have still not yet 
been brought to justice. In fact, not a single suspect has been named. 
The pipe bomb that killed Mr. Odeh as he opened the door to the 
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee's Santa Ana office that 
morning took his life and left a wife without a husband, three 
daughters without a father.
  Alex Odeh was a Palestinian-American activist and civil rights icon 
who served as the West Coast regional director for the ADC. He worked 
to erode pervasive stereotypes against Arabs in the media and stood for 
the human rights of all. The lack of progress in the investigation into 
his death is, at the very least, disturbing. For 36 years, the 
Department of Justice and FBI have been ignoring what they themselves 
deemed an act of domestic terrorism. Just a year after Mr. Odeh 's 
assassination, Rev. Jesse Jackson stood up and criticized the FBI's 
investigation, and that criticism has only become more prophetic.
  In 2013, 28 years after the bombing that took Alex Odeh's life, Ben 
Jealous, then the President of the NAACP, wrote an op-ed in which he 
compared Mr. Odeh to the civil rights icon Medgar Evers, highlighting 
``each man's commitment to building bridges beyond his community''. He 
wrote that Mr. Odeh's ``life and work shared strong parallels with 
Medgar Evers, as did his untimely and tragic death. Unlike Medgar 
Evers, however, the name Alex Odeh remains unrecognizable for too many 
Americans, and his murder remains unresolved.''
  Today, I am introducing a resolution to remember the life and work of 
Alex Odeh and to call for justice to be served. I ask my colleagues to 
join me in my call.