Arafat Assassinated?

[Brown]

Yasser Arafat died in 2004 at age 75. According to some sources, he had been in reasonably good health, when he abruptly took a turn for the worse and died.

Rumors circulated that Arafat had met with foul play. Suspicion quickly fell upon Israel, perhaps due to certain government sources who mouthed off that it would be better if Arafat were dead. Israel, to the absolute astonishment of no one on Earth, officially denied any involvement in Arafat's death. Other rumors were circulated that Arafat had died of embarrassing causes, such as AIDS.

Now a recent investigation has suggested that Arafat was murdered. An analysis of some of Arafat's personal items has shown unusually high levels of polonium-210, which is radioactive. Polonium-210 has been used as a poison, but does not show up in tests as a conventional chemical poison. Story here.

The medical records surrounding Arafat's health are sketchy, some have been kept private and some show an illness inconsistent with polonium poisoning. One of the symptoms of radiation exposure is hair loss, and though Arafat was bald, he kept his signature beard until the end. Also, his marrow tests were inconsistent with radiation exposure.

Still, the finding of a radioactive substance is suspicious as hell, and there may be one way to shed light on the issue: exhume Arafat and root around in his corpse for polonium atoms, and see whether there was enough there to cause him harm.

Exhumation seems to be a reasonable possibility. According to the National Post and Thomson Reuters, the Palestinian Authority has agreed to exhumation. "'The Authority, as it always has been, is ready to completely cooperate with and clear the way for an investigation into the true causes leading to the martyrdom of the late president,' said Nabil Abu Rdeineh, spokesman for [President Mahmoud] Abbas." So it looks like the Authority is keeping an open mind.

The question one may be wondering is: under what scenario can this sequence of events end well or lead to a peaceful resolution?

 

[Audible Click]

<my snippage>
"At the time, rumors flew that he had died from anything from stomach cancer to poisoning to AIDS. French doctors who treated Arafat in his final days said they could not establish the cause of death. French officials, citing privacy laws, refused to give details of the nature of his illness."
“I want the world to know the truth about the assassination of Yasser Arafat,” Suha Arafat, 48, told Al Jazeera, without making any direct accusations, but noting that both Israel and the United States saw him as an obstacle to peace."


http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/0...estinians-to-exhume-body-after-poison-report/

Perhaps I'm not reading the linked article correctly but his wife doesn't have any medical opinion from his French doctors regarding what may have caused his death? Or she does have his medical information and that caused her to suspect he was assassinated?

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

Still, the finding of a radioactive substance is suspicious as hell, and there may be one way to shed light on the issue: exhume Arafat and root around in his corpse for polonium atoms, and see whether there was enough there to cause him harm.

That would be 20+ half lives ago. Would the lead daughter isotope stand out?

ETA: Any idea when his belongings were tested?

 

[Brown]

Arafat's widow waited eight years before doing the testing of Arafat's possessions. At the time of his death, she resisted an autopsy. I have not seen or heard any report yet that deals with chain of custody or protection or preservation of Yasser's things. Before any fingers get pointed or rocks get thrown or guns get fired or bombs get detonated, it probably would be a really swell idea to establish chain of custody that shows no post-death contamination.

After all, what possible purpose could be served by seeding the dreaded substance on the possessions AFTER Arafat was gone? Or more to the point, what possible purpose could be served by ISRAEL seeding the dreaded substance on the possessions AFTER Arafat was gone?

 

[BStrong]

The CT at the time was that Arafat died from complications of AIDS, but that could well be disinfo.

I doubt that anybody seriously interested in getting rid of him would go the slow death route, but you never know.

 

[Robrob]

Geez, he was only 75. It's not like he could have died from natural causes or anything is it?

 

[theprestige]

So what if he was assassinated?

Is it unreasonable for him to have been high on someone's assassination list?

 

[portlandatheist]

So what if he was assassinated?

Is it unreasonable for him to have been high on someone's assassination list?

And if he was assassinated, just as likely by a rival Palestinian faction than by some Israeli plot. As much as I love the thought of him being offed, I think this is just wishful thinking.

 

[JihadJane]

So what if he was assassinated?

Is it unreasonable for him to have been high on someone's assassination list?

In those days, before assassination became official US policy, it was still somewhat frowned upon.

 

[theprestige]

In those days, before assassination became official US policy, it was still somewhat frowned upon.

No more frowned upon then than now, I suspect.

I also suspect that you may be confusing "US policy" and "public knowledge".

Anyway, so what?

Is unreasonable that Arafat should have been high on someone's assassination list?

 

[Beerina]

So what if he was assassinated?

Is it unreasonable for him to have been high on someone's assassination list?

Really. Live by the sword, die by the sword. He made me cynical over mideast politics, that all these people aren't fighting for freedom, but the leadership is just stirring them up so they can have a little revolution, then take charge themselves, so it becomes them at the head of the kleptocracy instead of some other jackass. See also bin Laden. Oooh, the Saudi Royal Family is hassling my own family, worth $300 million, and the US is helping them stay in power.


I had to laugh -- just after 9/11, when there were that day films of Palestinians cheering the towers falling, apologists claimed, fake! That's old footage of something else! CNN was like, "Like hell it is!" and it turned out to be real.

Arafat immediately made a big deal of (pointlessly) donating blood for the 9/11 cause, in gross opposition to his own people, who were just living up to the hate-filled rhetoric he and his ilk spread for the purpose of maintaining their own power.

But he knew that if the US said, eff you! to the Palestinian cause over this, it was all over for him. So blow the Americans as hard as possible in a show piece.

 

[Doctor Evil]

By weird coincidence I just watched a documentary on this conspiracy theory on Israeli TV last week. (That is before these tests.) Based on that program, and my recollections from the period, my 2c is that Israel is unlikely to have assassinated him, but that this is not impossible either.

The documentary points out that claims that Arafat was poisoned surfaced at the time he died. It also points out that Arafat's legacy would be enhanced if he was be found to be killed by Israel (instead of dying of natural causes).

I think that Israel had more to lose than to gain from killing him. Lets start from the situation just before Arafat died. At the time Arafat was isolated, and was essentially besieged in his office compound in Ramalla. Killing him would not gain much, as he was already made ineffective. What would Israel gain?

It is true that Sharon, which was the Israeli PM, hated Arafat with passion. He would probably have loved to kill him if he could, but there was a problem, namely the US. Based on the TV documentary, Sharon have personally promised president Bush that he would not hurt Arafat. Isolate him, or humiliate him, but not hurt him. Just to clarify, Sharon had relationship of mutual trust with Bush, and was interested to keep it. He have seen two instances where betraying US trust was demonstrated to be a very bad idea, and was not likely to test this. (For those interested: During the first Lebanon war Sharon lied to his prime minister and to the US about IDF operations in west Beirut. He was treated as persona non grata by the US for years after that. He also saw how Bush treated Arafat after Arafat lied to him about smuggling weapons from Iran on the Karin A.) The upshot on all this is that there was not much to gain, and a lot to lose by killing Arafat.

The TV documentary also goes over claims that Arafat had AIDS. They show a part of an interview of Ahmed Gibril where he says that one of the PLO heads told him personally that Arafat dies of AIDS. They also discuss claims that AIDS was found in checks to the cause of death and was suppressed, though they do not substantiate it. (The lab in France which did the checks refuses to publish information because patient information is confidential. They need family approval.)

The documentary concludes with the suggestion that we may never know what happened, due to lack of good evidence. I feel that we are still in the same situation. There was not chain of custody for the items tested. So they could have been tampered with during the seven years following his death. Arafat full medical records are not made public. I do not expect this to change soon.

 

[Brown]

I have been listening to reports about these events from Canadian news services, which often use international (rather than United States-based) news services. The reports have been stunningly predictable.

Reporters have found, with no apparent difficulty of any kind, a number of Palestinians who are quite convinced that Arafat was indeed murdered and that Israel is the murderer. The actual evidence seems to be unimportant to their conclusion. No, the "reasoning" goes like this: when a person is deemed an enemy of Israel, Israel will get rid of that person; Arafat was deemed an enemy of Israel; therefore.... The logic is airtight.

But this is NOT NEWS, in the same way that "Dog Bites Man" is not news. NEWS would be something like an official spokesperson or citizen's group saying, "We need to see the evidence before coming to any conclusion about the cause of Arafat's death. We currently have no solid proof of foul play. We do not think we should accuse anyone until we have good reason to believe that a crime has actually been committed, and naturally we believe that all suspects should be deemed innocent until the evidence shows otherwise."

Israel, in a breathtaking act of predictability, has again denied any involvement in Arafat's death.

 

[JihadJane]

No more frowned upon then than now, I suspect.

I also suspect that you may be confusing "US policy" and "public knowledge".

Anyway, so what?

Is unreasonable that Arafat should have been high on someone's assassination list?

So you'd support the assassination of Barack Obama?

 

[fagin]

So you'd support the assassination of Barack Obama?

I think you are missing something, the difference between making a point and supporting that point.

 

[JihadJane]

I think you are missing something, the difference between making a point and supporting that point.

theprestige's point was "So what if he was assassinated?" Maybe I'm wrong, but that looks like he was supporting the point he was making. That's how Beerina seems to have interpreted it, too.

 

[fagin]

Well then you are confused, the "so what" refers to
"I also suspect that you may be confusing "US policy" and "public knowledge"."

Which is incidental to the discussion.

The point that he may have been on an assasination list is a reasonable observation, bearing in mind the general murkiness of middle eastern politics. For many years he was the leader of a terrorist organisation, or a freedom fighter, whichever you want. Is unreasonable that Arafat should have been high on someone's assassination list?

 

[sarge]

So you'd support the assassination of Barack Obama?

By whom? Your question seems to assume a "good for the goose, good for the gander" component that does not (or should not) exist in international relations. I can, without contradiction, desire that my goverment engage in assassinations without also wishing that other nations practice assassination.

I can, without contradiction, support assassination as a valid means of achieving a desirable end without necessarily supporting the assassination of any particular person. I would support the assassination by agents of the US of any enemy of the best interests of the citizens of the US provided:

1) the enemy represents a real threat to the best interests of the citizens of the US

2) the enemy can not be more effectively neutralized in some other fashion.

 

[theprestige]

So you'd support the assassination of Barack Obama?

Not particularly. But I can understand that someone else might, and I wouldn't take it amiss if they had a go.

Certainly the US President is enough of a threat to the world that he's understandably a target for all sorts of people, for reasons right and wrong. And the same was true of Arafat.

It's not like rising to the top of a terrorist organization suddenly exempts you from getting shot in the face by the next counter-terrorist troop that happens your way.

ETA: So, again, what? So what if he got assassinated? Was assassination ever actually off the table, for any of the major factions opposed to his plans and projects?

 

[theprestige]

theprestige's point was "So what if he was assassinated?" Maybe I'm wrong, but that looks like he was supporting the point he was making. That's how Beerina seems to have interpreted it, too.

I apologize for any confusion.

Let me be clear: I do support the assassination of Yasser Arafat (assuming that's what in fact happened). He was definitely on my "needed killing" list, and assassination has never been off the table for me as an option.

But that's not the point I'm making. Or rather, it's not the question I'm asking. The question I'm asking is, "so what if he was assassinated?"

I'm not making a point, I'm asking: What's the point of noting that he might have been assassinated?

Is the possibility really that unlikely? Is it really that shocking? Is it really that unacceptable?