Was Yasser Arafat poisoned? Palestinians ready to exhume body

Contra Costa Times ^ | 07/05/2012

[SeekAndFind]

RAMALLAH, West Bank - The Palestinian president cleared the way Wednesday for a possible autopsy on Yasser Arafat's remains, following a request from his widow after a Swiss lab said it found elevated levels of a lethal radioactive isotope on the longtime Palestinian leader's belongings.

The developments have reignited a storm of speculation over what killed Arafat, who died on Nov. 11, 2004 at the age of 75 at a military hospital outside Paris after decades of fighting with Israel.

Arafat's widow, Suha, who rejected an autopsy at the time of his death, said she wanted one done now in the wake of the lab's findings, first reported by the Arab satellite TV station Al-Jazeera. In an interview with the station, she did not explain why she waited nearly eight years to have the belongings, including a toothbrush and a fur hat, tested.

French doctors said at the time that Arafat died of a massive brain hemorrhage - weeks after he fell violently ill at his West Bank compound.

Arafat had suffered intestinal inflammation, jaundice and a blood condition known as disseminated intravascular coagulation, or DIC, according to French medical records. But the records were inconclusive about what brought about DIC, which has numerous causes including infections, colitis and liver disease. Outside experts who reviewed the records on behalf of The Associated Press were also unable to pinpoint the underlying cause.

The uncertainty prompted many in the Arab world to allege he was killed by Israel, which viewed him as an obstacle to a peace treaty. Israeli officials have vociferously denied any foul play.

[Iron Munro]

This is Kabuki Theater muslim style.

They have already decided what they are going to find.

[SeekAndFind]

Experts found higher quantities of polonium in, for example, a urine stain on underwear worn by Arafat and a blood stain on hospital clothing than on belongings he hadn't used, such as new and unworn socks stored in the same bag.

Polonium is best known for causing the death of Alexander Litvinenko, a one-time KGB agent turned critic of the Russian government, in London in 2006. Litvinenko ingested tea laced with the substance.

Yasser Arafat's body may be exhumed to allow for more testing of the causes of his death, the Palestinian president said Wednesday, July 4, 2012.

[Cletus.D.Yokel]

Of course he was!

Some Semitic arsenekoyt introduced him to HIV.

[Red Badger]

A salad with polonium-210 dressing on the side, please...............

[twister881]

His mind certainly was.

[Puppage]

Polonium is a gay porn star

[Cyber Liberty]

Yes, I think they should dig up the body. Then, on every anniversary of the reburial, they should dig him up again. The A-hole deserves no “RIP.”

Muslims have a morbid fascination with corpses. Remember when, in Iran, Ayatolla Khomenei croaked? They paraded the corpse around a huge gathering over their heads, mosh-pit style.

[End Times Sentinel]

I’m certain he was killed by an Israeli AIDS Rocket.

[Edgar3]

Hell yeah! I mean look, he would still be around today, sodomizing young boys and heaping more misery on the poor dolts who thought he was a god. It’s obviously all Bush/Israel’s fault, right?

[Reily]

well we already know what the Palestinian findings will be....THE JEWS KILLED HIM!

Now the question in my mind is why do this now?
I find the timing interesting.

[freedomrings69]

I wonder if his dead person is as ugly as his live one was.

[twister881]

This is all being done as a phony pretext by the Muslim B’hood now running Egypt to break the peace treaty w/ Israel. Watch...

[ModelBreaker]

I thought he died when he was in a wheelchair and got pushed off a cruise boat by a terrorist.

[Reily]

bingo !

Give that man a cigar!

[jazusamo]

Probably but I want to know what took them so long.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Rewriting the Arafat story

Op-ed: Latest Arafat conspiracy theory merely an effort to arrange a more dignified death

Fatah’s old guard, and especially Arafat’s family, has a great task: Arranging a dignified death for the father of the Palestinian nation.

The fact that Arafat left the stage while afflicted with a disease that one does not speak about openly, far away from his people, at a French hospital, is incommensurate with the national ethos.

Moreover, immediately after his death, Arafat’s wife, Suha, openly accused the PLO’s top brass of killing him. On top of it, she extorted huge sums of hush money from them.

There is no doubt that it’s much more dignified to arrange a heroic “martyr’s death” for the father of the nation, preferably at the hands of Mossad or Shin Bet. Indeed, every year we see yet another theory about an Israeli conspiracy against Arafat. This time we are being told about a lethal, radioactive toxin implanted by Mossad agents on the supreme leader’s famous fur hat and other items around him.

The truth about Arafat’s death is still found in the medical file possessed by his widow, Suha, who refuses to publish it to this very day. The French hospital is also refraining from publishing the file, as result of the widow’s objection. Suha Arafat knows the truth, and is apparently not quite comfortable with this truth.

The Palestinian Authority, PLO and Fatah announced over the years the formation of at least three commissions of inquiry tasked with looking into the circumstances of Arafat’s death. However, none of these committees ever published any conclusions and did not report receiving the leader’s medical file from his widow.

On the other hand, Ahmad Jibril, the head of the Popular Front and an Arafat rival, said that top PLO officials told him that Arafat died of AIDS. In Israel as well, intelligence officials estimated that he died of AIDS or of another infection that prompted his bodily systems to collapse.

Israeli officials in fact liked the version whereby Israel’s long intelligence arms are omnipotent and killed Arafat, and thereby made do with winks and smiles, as if they really knew what was going on in the Palestinian leader’s body. It should also be noted that on the eve of his death, Arafat was perceived by Israel’s defense establishment as a first-rate public relations asset: He was unstable, confused, isolated in his headquarters and not functioning well.

At that point, Israel had no interest in assassinating him.

And now, al-Jazeera comes out with an investigative report about a radioactive substance that killed Arafat. The report does not explain where exactly all these articles of clothing, tainted with this radioactive substance, were being held for the past seven years, ever since they were taken from their owner.

Perhaps once the investigative reporters manage to pinpoint the journey these tainted items made until they reached the lab in Switzerland, this radioactive mystery will be resolved.

[richardtavor]

He died of AIDS.

[prisoner6]

Yup, he was poisoned before he wasn’t.

[molson209]

I’d say he drank some Palestinian tap water by mistake ,but who cares main point he’s dead