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Palestinian bus bomber loses US citizenship for lying about terror conviction

A terrorist who was imprisoned in Israel for bombing a bus has been sentenced in the U.S. for lying to immigration authorities when he became a citizen.

By WIN Staff and AP

Fifty-one-year-old Vallmoe Shqaire who was living in Downey, California was sentenced to nine months in federal prison Friday for unlawfully procuring U.S. citizenship in 2008. He also was stripped of his citizenship and will be deported to Jordan.

Shqaire spent four years in prison for helping in the 1988 attempted roadside bombing of a bus.

The pipe bomb exploded but nobody was hurt. Shqaire carried out the terror attack as an operative of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), which was classified as a terrorist organization by the U.S.

Shqaire pleaded guilty in January to concealing the bombing conviction and his PLO ties on his citizenship application.

Shqaire’s case emerges after the high-profile deportation of Rasmea Yousef Odeh, who lost her U.S. citizenship and was sent to Jordan for lying to American immigration officials about her life sentence in Israel for her involvement in two 1969 terror bombings.

One of the bombings occurred in a crowded supermarket in Jerusalem, killing 21-year-old Leon Kanner and 22-year-old Eddie Joffe, and wounding nine others.