Real Tragedy in Arafat Assassination Plot Story
By Ramzy Baroud
Journalist
 Why have not the United Nations and international community asked for an international investigation on Arafat's death, as they have done on Lebanon's Rafik Al-Hariri's? (Reuters photo) |
Who killed Yasser Arafat? When the Palestinian leader was declared dead in a French hospital, on November 11, 2004, there was no way of knowing how questions pertaining to his death should be phrased.
Was he killed, or did he die from old age? If he was killed, then who killed him and why? The "mysterious" nature of his symptoms — galvanized a dominant theory that the man was poisoned over a period of time — provided enough evidence that foul play was involved, even indicting some of those closest to him.
Although the man's story has been recorded in the ever-growing chronicle of the Palestinian struggle, and Palestinians have somehow moved on, recent breaking news has blown his story wide open once more, breeding new controversy and stories of conspiracy.
Nearly five years have passed since Arafat died. During those years, a number of high-ranking Palestinian leaders, especially from the Hamas movement were assassinated by Israel in various and consistently gory methods.
To Every Palestinian, He Is a Martyr
Among Palestinians, Arafat is referred to like all those killed by Israel, as a "martyr", an indication of the widespread belief that his death was hardly the result of natural causes.
If Arafat was indeed killed, and since his death was not caused by an Israeli air strike, or an assassin's bullet, a key question has been lingering, giving heed to all sorts of interpretations, who killed Arafat and how?
Israelis made little secret of their desire to see Arafat dead. Former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon expressed regret in a newspaper interview on February 1, 2002 that he had not killed Arafat decades ago when he had the chance. Sharon told Israeli newspaper Maariv that he should have "eliminated" Arafat during Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982. "Do you regret it (not killing Arafat)?" he was asked. "Certainly, yes," he replied.
Held hostage in his bullet-riddled West Bank office for years, Arafat represented an international embarrassment for Israel. He was not "moderate" enough to concede all Palestinian rights, but "moderate" enough to maintain an aura of international attention, and support among Arab, Muslim, European, and other nations.
Still, in the minds of some, Arafat was determined, and often declared to represent an "obstacle". The Palestinian Authority's (PA) truly "moderate" camp disliked him for his tireless compromises aimed at prevented factional infighting, thus blocking their attempts at dominating the Palestinian society.
Israel despised him for numerous reasons, notwithstanding his refusal to "concede" on issues of paramount importance, such as the issues of refugees and Jerusalem. The Bush administration took every opportunity to discredit, discount, and insult him, constantly propping up an "alternative" leadership, namely, Mahmoud Abbas, Mohammed Dahalan, and others.
Strangely enough, even Abbas and other high-ranking PA officials referred to Arafat as a "martyr", especially whenever they needed to capitalize on his legacy among low-ranking Fatah members and ordinary Palestinians.
However, the story was meant to end here, with Abbas and Dahlan, carrying the torch of Arafat the "martyr" continue with their rhetoric-based "revolution" to liberate Palestine.
Kaddumi Turns the Table On Fatah
Kaddumi had in fact criticized the convention of a supposedly "revolutionary" movement held with Israeli consent, if not support. |
That, until the second highest-ranking Fatah member and one of the PLO's most visible leaders Farouk Kaddumi broadcasted a document that contained some unanticipated indictment; that Abbas and Dahlan, along with Sharon, US Undersecretary of State William Burns, and others jointly plotted the assassination of Arafat. Kaddumi's document contained the minutes of that meeting in 2004.
Kaddumi broke the news in a press conference in Amman, Jordan on July 12, 2009, asserting that Arafat had entrusted him with the minutes of that secret meeting involving top Israeli, Palestinian, and American leaders and officials.
The plot, according to Kaddumi included the assassination of other Palestinian leaders, some of them have indeed been assassinated since then, while others are still alive, thanks to the failure of Israeli missiles and car bombs that failed to deliver.
Expectedly, the Ramallah-based Fatah leaders launched fierce verbal attacks against Kaddumi, questioning his objectives, timing, and even his sanity.
Abbas accused Kaddumi of wanting to torpedo the Fatah faction long-delayed congress, scheduled to convene in Bethlehem on August 4. "He (Kaddumi) knows full well that this information is false; he has released it to undermine the convention, but we are continuing with preparations," Abbas said.
Kaddumi had in fact criticized the convention of a supposedly "revolutionary" movement held with Israeli consent, if not support.
Good Reason to Believe Kaddumi?
The fact is, we may never know the authenticity of Kaddumi's report without an independent investigation or irrefutable evidence. However, similar to Arafat's death, conclusive evidence is not always required for the public to formulate an opinion over such issues.
Considering Israel's threats to Arafat, Palestinians have no reason to believe that Israel did not kill him. Similarly, ordinary Palestinians, especially those in Gaza, have little reason to trust that corrupt Palestinians were not involved in Arafat's death.
A clique of Palestinian elite have made it clear that their personal interests surpass those of the Palestinian people; Dahlan openly advocated the toppling of an elected government in Gaza, as the Ramallah-based "revolutionary" movement is dispatching US-armed and US-trained Palestinian militants to crack down on Israel's enemies in various West Bank towns.
As bizarre as all of this may sound, it is at least enough to explain why Palestinians are willing to believe the recent statements made by Kaddumi, a respected figure among all Palestinian factions.
True, Kaddumi's accusations are yet to be authenticated by an independent investigation, but they are made in a fractious, if not peculiar, political context that makes them most plausible, and in a sense, that is the real tragedy.
Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an author and editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His work has been published in many newspapers, journals, and anthologies around the world. His latest book is, "The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People's Struggle" (Pluto Press, London), and his forthcoming book is, "My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza's Untold Story" (Pluto Press, London).
FLASHBACK
WHO KILLED YASSER ARAFAT?
Thursday, August 16, 2007
(Ben Heine © Cartoons)
It seems that there is no longer any doubt as to what killed Yasser Arafat. As was reported HERE the other day, he was poisoned.
Now the big question is.... WHO DONE IT???
Was it Israel?
Was it Fatah?
Was it his wife?
One day we will know the truth.... in the meantime the following might get some wheels in motion...
Who killed Yasser Arafat?
by Khalid Amayreh
Who killed Yasser Arafat? This is the question that has been boggling many people’s minds ever since the late Palestinian leader’s mysterious death in November, 2004.
Then, many people, politicians and ordinary citizens alike, even Arafat’s own physician, Dr. Ashraf al-Kurdi, seemed convinced that Arafat didn’t die a natural death and that he was actually killed as a result of a certain poisonous substance injected into his body probably by agents of the Israeli Mossad.
This writer spoke to Sakhr Habash, a close former aide to Yasser Arafat shortly after Arafat’s death. Habash, now ill as a result of a stroke, said that Arafat was killed by “ Israel ’s agents.”
I remember him telling me “they killed him, they killed him.” And when I asked him who he was alluding to, Habash said “he was referring to Arafat’s opponents within the Fatah organization.”
Habash gave no names, but anyone could conjure up some of the people he had in mind.
The PLO and the Palestinian Authority formed a commission of inquiry to look into the matter of Arafat’s death. However, the commission went into dormancy as soon as it was formed as all cues led to a dead-end or to inaccessible figures or sovereign foreign governments, e.g. France, that wouldn’t cooperate.
Nearly two weeks ago, Bassam Abu Sharif, another former aide to Yasser Arafat, held a surprise news conference in Ramallah, marking Arafat’s 78th birthday, in which he pointed out that Arafat did die of poison and that he possessed credible evidence proving his hypothesis.
Abu Sharif appealed to former French president Jacques Chirac to disclose the cause of Arafat’s death, or more specifically, to reveal the type of poison that killed the late Palestinian leader.
Meanwhile, it was reported recently that the Tunisian government decided to withdraw the Tunisian citizenship from Arafat’s widow Suha Tawil who reportedly moved to Malta where she is now living.
Neither the Tunisian government nor Arafat’s widow elaborated on the matter as some pan-Arab newspapers speculated that the Tunisian measure was prompted by a business dispute between the former Mrs. Arafat and her Tunisian partner.
However, there have been allegations and rumors that Suha Tawil possessed “hard information” about Yasser Arafat’s death and that she received a legal undertaking from the French authorities to keep “Arafat’s medical records confidential.”
Moreover, there have been consistent reports circulating in the occupied Palestinian territories alleging that Suha Tawil had reached a “deal” with the top Fatah leadership in the West Bank whereby she received millions of dollars in return for “keeping her mouth shut.”
And it seems that both sides to the deal have kept their part of the bargain. However, it is obvious that the alleged deal between Palestine’s First Lady, as some pliant Palestinian newspapers used to refer to Suha al Tawil, and the top Fatah leadership, has failed to bury the Arafat’s death affair in the grave of history once and for all.
This week, Ashraf al Kurdi revealed in an interview with the pan-Arab Al Jazeera TV that HIV antibodies were found in Arafat’s blood. When Kurdi uttered these words, the station immediately halted the interview.
Al Jazeera officials didn’t say why they stopped the interview with Dr. al Kurdi, a noted cardiologist and former Jordanian Minister of Health, but journalists working for the satellite station in the Occupied Palestinian territories intimated that the famous station probably was worried that Kurdi’s revelations might put it in a difficult situation vis-à-vis the Palestinian Authority, especially the Fatah group, who might harm al-Jazeera’s correspondents and workers in Palestine.
Al-Kurdi, undeterred by Al-Jazeera’s nervous reflexes, clarified the matter further during an interview with the Jordanian Ammon website this week. He said he believed that Arafat was deliberately infected with the AIDS virus in order to obscure the real cause of his death and also in order to tarnish his name, e.g. by creating the impression that Arafat may have been gay, a disgraceful trait in traditional Arab society.
Al-Kurdi, who was Arafat’s personal physician for 18 years, didn’t say how he was able to know that HIV viruses were found in Arafat’s blood and why he thought that the actual cause of his death was poison, not AIDS.
Al Kurdi left many questions unanswered when he pointed out that he was prevented from seeing the late Palestinian leader when his life was really deteriorating.
“They used to call me whenever he had a simple common cold, but when his life started to deteriorate , his wife, Suha, wouldn’t allow me to travel with him to the hospital in Paris; no doctor at the French military hospital contacted me for details about his health, and after he died, the current Palestinian Chairman didn’t allow Arafat’s grave to be reopened in order to determine the cause of his death.”
Interestingly, al Kurdi’s revelation that Arafat’s blood contained the HIV virus was previously unknown and certainly unconfirmed. This writer interviewed al-Kurdi on Arafat’s death nearly two years ago, and he made no reference to the infectious disease.
Hence, one is prompted to ask what is the source of al-Kurdi’s revelations? And who has a vested interest in making these revelations at this time? And is there a certain “insider” trying to blackmail or expose the culprits for money or political concessions or both?
Moreover, why did Suha Arafat prevent Ashraf al-Kurdi from seeing her husband after he was transferred to the military hospital in Paris? Also, does her expulsion from Tunis have anything to do with some undeclared revelations about her possible complicity or culpability in Arafat’s death.?
These and other questions are awaiting satisfactory answers.
Khalid Amayreh, a frequent contributor to ZioPedia.org, lives in Occupied East Jerusalem.
Source
Who Killed Yasser Arafat?
By Ghada Karmi
12 November, 2004
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