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Subscribe to RSSInvestigators have begun to exhume the body of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in an attempt to determine whether he was assassinated by lethal doses of radioactive poison. NBC's John Ray reports.
Did the late Palestinian leader die of poisoning? This is the nagging question that French investigators hope to answer by exhuming the remains of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat on Tuesday, eight years after his death in a Paris hospital at the age of 75.
French judges in charge of the investigation arrived on Sunday evening in the West Bank city of Ramallah, the site of Arafat's mausoleum, in a murder investigation that was opened in August, the French news agency AFP reported.
Rumors of foul play have long surrounded the sudden demise of Arafat, a champion of Palestinian statehood from the time he was 19, and eventually, the democratically-elected president of the Palestinian Authority.
Arafat was revered by many Palestinians and Arabs as a freedom fighter, and reviled by many Israelis and its allies as a terrorist for his relentless fight for Palestinian self-determination. But he also had enemies and rivals within the Arab and Palestinian political circles.
The rapid deterioration of his health and death baffled doctors who were trying to treat him in France, and an autopsy was never performed at the request of his widow, Suha.
Many Palestinians believe Arafat was poisoned at the behest of Israel — an idea that Israel has rejected.
But poisoning as a cause of death gained currency after a Swiss institute said it had found high levels of radioactive polonium on Arafat’s clothing, which was supplied by Suha, prompting the French to open a formal murder inquiry.
Polonium was the substance that killed Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006. Litvenenko was a Russian ex-spy who later became a relentless critic of the Kremlin.
"It is a painful necessity" to exhume the body of Arafat, said Tawfiq al-Tirawi, who is in charge of the Palestinian committee overseeing the investigation, speaking to reporters in Ramallah on Saturday.
Tirawi said the Palestinians had "evidence which suggests Arafat was assassinated by Israelis," Reuters reported.
Tirawi said separate samples will be taken from the remains by the French and Swiss forensic teams, as well as a Russian team of experts invited by the Palestinians, and that results could take up to several months to be announced. Arafat’s body would be reburied in a military ceremony, he said.
Not everyone agrees that exhuming the late leader serves a purpose because even if it shows that he was poisoned — which may be hard to establish this long after his death — it won’t reveal who poisoned him.
The exhumation and renewed allegations of Israeli involvement could stir further tension between the Palestinians and Israelis, who are observing a truce after a week of fierce fighting in Gaza.
An editorial in the Jerusalem Post on Monday lambasted the process.
"Can we really rely on an impartial forensic investigation now? Too much political capital appears to have been invested in this affair to instill much confidence that everything will be strictly on the up and up. This, moreover, is without even going into the issue of whether all evidentiary material is in fact untainted."
Another critic of the exhumation — for entirely different reasons — is Arafat’s nephew Nasser al-Qidwa, who compared the process to "desecration," the AFP reported.
"No good can come out of this at all," Qidwa told the agency. "It does no good to the Palestinians."
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Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook
Reuters contributed to this report.
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Couldn't be a very pleasant task -- Arafat was pretty gross looking to begin with ... !
By now he'll look like a rotten pork roast decked out in a plaid kitchen towel. I think way back then he watched too many Porter Wagner/Dolly Parton promos for Boxes of Breeze and mistook the towel inside for headwear. Just guessin' though.
I bet he smells a whole better dead than when he was alive.
They exhumed me a few years ago. Now I'm back and Angry as Hell!! The SPOILER on the budget deal and the American political scene!!!
Bull.
Arafat (the Egyptian) was reviled because he was a murderer, a man who advocated the killing of innocent people and a scumbag that started conflict even after he was offered 99% of what he wanted.
Arafat was vermin, and his death is celebrated by all who love freedom.
No sarcasm intended, but for arafat that was a compliment, it was and always will be a terrorist. The scum is where it belongs as it's post pubescent bride spends all the palestinians aid money in France.
If they find it was poisoned then what, put it back in the box and put it back in it's hole, total waste of time and money, however
If it desecrates him in his family's and palestinian eyes then more power to you France, exhume it 72 times, one for each of it's child brides/virgins
No doubt Arafat was poisoned by mossad to eliminate anyone opposed to the occupation and oppression by the zionist rogue state.
No doubt he was poisoned by his wife when she found out about his affair with a younger man.
Zionist rogue state my ass.
The only "rogue" state THAT NEVER HAS BEEN A STATE, is Palestine.
Take your crap to another thread.
One that supports terrorists.
@Henri von Dork
Bahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!
As I said before on this subject; drop the body in the ocean and end this nonsense. He is gone but not soon enough.
We don't need any part of him back. Who cares how he died, just why did it take so long to do it.
Why poison the ocean??!!
I say wrap it in bacon and then encase it in cement made with ground-up hogs and send it to Egypt!
I've been hearing this for months...Just exhume the body and be done with this...This guy got a Nobel peace prize? He was given 99.9% of all his demands when Clinton was president and he walked away from the peace process....he was an idiot, a murderer and a piece of scum.
Who cares why Arafat died. He's dead, gone buried and millions hope to never hear his name again. Now to dig him up and bring more hatred into the World. That's all these people want, period.
and as usual, who cares. it almost sounds like a line from casablancs.."round up the usual suspects". the autopsy results will not change opinions of how he died.
"age of 75." OMG struck down in the prime of his life. so sad.
Doesn't pay for a coroner to be NOSY.. haha
Why?
It will be just as rotten now as the day it was put in the ground.
Arafat was an archterrorist- born in Cairo,Egypt by the way and a fedayeen (then Muslim Brotherhood). He and Fatah- he and Strike Froce 17- he and Black September not only killed Jews all over the world- they tried to overtake Jordan in 1971 blowing up airlines and calling international TV anchors to witness same (Dawson Fields,Jordan). The Polonium Case- ask scientists how much polonium would have been needed ab initio when 8 yrs later the amount was so much in his clothing that surely Suha (who has an outstanding Interpol notice from Tunisia for improperly acquired monies) did not die from the exposure? Make Arafat's military hospital records available for all to see what he had (that is why Suha-Arafat's wife did not agree to an autopsy). Show also all TV footage of Arafat 2 yrs prior to his death and have people see how he was shaking,drooling,had blotches on his skin (face).When all these forensic people are at the mausoleum and taking samples- take samples also from the earth.cement slabs and inventory from his trousers' pockets and film it all. French military hospital took all kinds of samples from him and the findings were not consistent with any poisoning.
he really had syphilis
No, I understand that polonium was discovered recently in the French samples. This begs the question of why no one bothered to test these samples earlier.
God bless the hand that killed the SOB.
So exhume him already!!! For crying out loud, the reports on "the authorities are preparing to exhume Arafat" have been on the news for several days now. Once is enough, then one article on what the find, then shut up already.
Finally, something no one is blaming Bush on...
Isn't THAT amazing?!!
If Israel really wanted peace with Palestine they would have stopped building Jewish settlements in the West Bank long ago. And the Israelis wonder why the Palestinians launch so many terrorist attacks against them. Nevertheless, I believe that East Jerusalem should remain in Israeli hands, although the rest of Palestine should be declared independent. If Israel refuses to see justice, then economic sanctions should be imposed on the Apartheid State. Before the Palestinians were Muslims, they were Byzantine Christians, and before that they were either Jews or Greco-Roman pagans. History can be very ironic.
And if palestine wanted peace they would have stopped firing rockets.
Your argument might work with your fellow goatherds, but not with us. We know better.
@Ardent Stupor,
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah!
To "god"/not, no Jewish settlements in West Bank =no Palestinian rockets. A simple equation for a simple minded person like you. To Proud.American.Veteran: If you served in the second American-Iraq War, I understand your frustration at finding no weapons of mass destruction/deception. George Bush junior would have done better to look in Iran. All said, I wonder just how long Barak Obama will be patient with Iran before he decides to strike its nuclear facilities?
And what will they find? That Generalissimo Francisco Franco...er, I mean Yasser Arafat -- is still dead.
That was wicked funny!!!!
Arafat was a pedophile. I do not understand a culture that makes heros of men who rape little boys!
Arafat was a pedophile! I do not understand a culture that makes heros of men that rape little boys!
8 years later would it still show up, as they bury them within 24 hours and don't embalm them there can't be much left, and why bother because I doubt anyone cares how he died, just that he is dead.
Then why do you think they're digging him up? You're not very smart.
I bet a lot of putrefaction has occurred eh, stormrider??
-god? is that really you??
Say something profound!! Pleeease??
Polonium 210, a very active radio-isotope capable of killing, will show up no matter how decayed the body is.
If it's there, almost nobody can get polonium 241 and feed it to a person, except for someone with special nuclear material access.
Then the question would be; Who in this case has special nuclear material access?
That person would be responsible for Arafat's death.
007 did it.
Russia, North Korea, China, Pakistan,India, France, United Kingdom, United States, and Israel...
"as a terrorist for his relentless fight for Palestinian" uh no - he was labeled a terrorist because he terrorized by instructing indiscriminate murder of other people
"as a terrorist for his relentless fight for Palestinian". Error. As a terrorist for his relentless murder of innocents
The only good terrorist is a dead terrorist. Arafat is now a good terrorist and is in just the right place.
This has been a repetitive headline for many days now. Enough. Tell us if they find something.
Wouldn't it be ironic if they opened it up and found only a burial cloth with his imprint on it..?
I can just see it now.. "He has arisen..!!" ..and then we'd have yet another Judaic spin-off!!