Who Killed Alex Odeh?

Directors Jason Osder and William Lafi Youmans expected to attend

Palestinian activist and poet Alex Odeh was a man devoted to dialogue, dignity, and mutual understanding. In 1985, on the night he was slated to speak at the Jewish Community Center, and as anti-Arab rhetoric was reaching a fever pitch in American media, Odeh was assassinated by a pipe bomb at his office in Santa Ana, California. Four decades later, his murder remains unsolved, despite suspects identified early on. Winner of two prizes at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival, including a Special Jury Award for Journalistic Excellence, this powerful documentary from filmmakers Jason Osder and William Lafi Youmans presents a mosaic of stirring archival footage, dogged investigative reporting, and testimony from Odeh’s family still pursuing justice today. Asking the titular question uncovers a heap of buried evidence, from FBI memos to uneasy interviews, and yields unexpected and sobering answers related to how ideology, disinformation, and geopolitical alliances can stall accountability. —Jesse Knight

JFI Supported: 2025 Completion Grant and recipient of the Envision Award

Jason Osder is the director of Let the Fire Burn. It premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and went on to play more than 50 film festivals and won the best editing prize at RIDM, the IDA Prize in Editing, the Cinema Eye Honor for Editing and the Independent Spirit Truer than Fiction Award. Jason is Associate Professor at The George Washington University.

William Lafi Youmans is an Associate Professor in Residence Northwestern University in Qatar. Youmans holds a Ph.D. as well as a J.D. He sits on the board of the Arab America Foundation. As an experienced researcher on Arab American history and Middle East politics, he is the project’s subject-matter expert on Alex Odeh.