What Killed Arafat?

[David Guyatt]

They could have blown him up in a car bomb like they did to many others. Or shot like the Lebanese PM. A targeted missile on his residence or car. His compound could have been one of hundreds of 'collateral damage' in some sort of Operation Cast Lead by another name. But they chose polonium so he would die slowly and possibly untracably unitl now.

Yep, Israel has never been worried about showing how their wrath strikes, and it just doesn't sound like they dunnit because of that. But the Russian polonium connection discussed by Peter above is really interesting and, for me anyway, might further suggest the corruption angle -- so many Jewish money 'n' power connections between Israel and Russia exist.

[Magda Hassan]

Perhaps this will be a mini-Dallas and evolve into multiple competing theories - with the real villains encouraging all the alternative ones.

Interestingly the journalist does mention JFK in passing. His role as a former State Department operator before becoming a journalist is also intriguing. And his interest in pushing for the whole examination of Arafat's death, forensic testing, etc. Maybe he has his role/s to play as well.

[Magda Hassan]

They could have blown him up in a car bomb like they did to many others. Or shot like the Lebanese PM. A targeted missile on his residence or car. His compound could have been one of hundreds of 'collateral damage' in some sort of Operation Cast Lead by another name. But they chose polonium so he would die slowly and possibly untracably unitl now.

Yep, Israel has never been worried about showing how their wrath strikes, and it just doesn't sound like they dunnit because of that. But the Russian polonium connection discussed by Peter above is really interesting and, for me anyway, might further suggest the corruption angle -- so many Jewish money 'n' power connections between Israel and Russia exist.

Going back to the polonium poisoning revelations in AJ Israel felt it necessary to wheel out the gay/AIDS propaganda against Arafat. Interesting.

After polonium revelation, Israel's PR hacks revive lies that Arafat was gay and died of AIDS

Submitted by Ali Abunimah on Wed, 07/04/2012 - 18:33

3245138801_e9740d3bcc_o.jpg

Yasser Arafat's tombstone in Ramallah. (Tristam Sparks / Flickr)


While Israel markets itself as the most gay-friendly country in the world, its PR hacks are busy reviving homophobic rumors that Arafat was a gay "sexual deviant" who died of AIDS due to his promiscuity.
On Tuesday, Aljazeera broke a bombshell story that the clothes Arafat wore as he died of a sudden and mysterious illness in 2004, contained strong traces of the lethal radioactive element polonium, raising the possibility that he may have been poisoned.
Arafat fell ill on 12 October 2004 at his Ramallah headquarters where he was besieged by Israeli forces and died in a French military hospital in Paris on 11 November 2004.
Following Aljazeera's revelations, Arafat's widow, Suha Arafat, has called for her late husband's body to be exhumed so that further tests could be carried out.

Genealogy of a lie: Arafat "died of AIDS"

Following the Aljazeera report, Lenny Ben-David, former Deputy Chief of Mission at the Israeli Embassy in Washington and current public relations consultant to the Israeli government, posted a lurid article at The Times of Israel reviving rumors that Arafat died of AIDS and blaming his "sexual proclivities":

Yasser Arafat was a murderous, genocidal, diabolical, duplicitous sexual deviant who died at the age of 75. He was despised by Arab and Israeli alike.

Ben-David dismisses the possibility that Arafat was poisoned and asserts:

Less romantic and mythical, however, is the more likely cause of Arafat's death AIDS.
Arafat's sexual proclivities have been an open secret for years. The former head of Rumanian intelligence, Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa, disclosed in his book "Red Horizons," that one of his officers reported, "the Fedayee' [Arafat's code name] is in his bedroom making love to his bodyguard. The one I knew was his latest lover. He's playing tiger again. The officer monitoring his microphones connected me live with the bedroom, and the squawling almost broke my eardrums. Arafat was roaring like a tiger, and his lover yelping like a hyena."

In addition to this "evidence," Ben-David cites another piece of "proof" that has circulated widely on Zionist websites:

After Arafat's death, his personal physician admitted in a TV interview that his patient died of AIDS.

Both of these pieces of "evidence" are junk.
Notably, Ben-David's article has been tweeted and amplified by influential former AIPACoperative Josh Block.

Embedded rich on Twitter

Old story of #Arafat being poisoned is back again, but more likely the vile terrorist died of #AIDS blogs.timesofisrael.com/for-the-palest…
Josh Block (@JoshBlockDC) July 4, 2012

Fabrications as source of Arafat rumor

The account from Ion Pacepa a former Romanian intelligence official which appears to be the original source of the rumors about Arafat's sexuality was described by Scott Long recently as a collection of "fabrications":

Putative insults directed at the sexualities of US enemies in the region are legion. There was, and is, for instance, a longstanding rumor that Yasser Arafat was gay and died of AIDS, spread by neoconservatives with glee. Unlike most rumors, it's possible to pinpoint this one's source with some precision. Ion Pacepa, chief of foreign intelligence in CeauÅŸescu's Romania, defected to the US in 1978, and later composed his memoir, Red Horizons, while under CIA protection. In it, he claimed that secret microphones caught Arafat making love to his male bodyguard while visiting Bucharest. The book is full of wild stories, and this particular propaganda gem had a two-birds usefulness for the US: it impugned not only Arafat for screwing a man, but CeauÅŸescu (notoriously puritanical) for tolerating it. The CIA called his book "an important and unique contribution to the United States," and it should be read as such, along with other important and unique fabrications such as the histories of Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch.

Ashraf al-Kurdi interview: dubious and distorted

Ben-David, and numerous other Zionist publications, have circulated this video of Ashraf al-Kurdi, purporting to state in Arabic that Arafat had died of AIDS. Not only is the clip mistranslated and apparently misleadingly edited, but Kurdi is actually on record saying the opposite.

palestinian arafat died of H.I.V (AIDS), DR al-kurdi. أبو عمار

This is what the subtitles claim Kurdi said:

I asked to talk with one of the French doctors, I wanted to hear from them about his condition, but they didn't answer me. When the president Yasser Arafat died, they sent me an e-mail, or a notification which according to it the president Arafat is hospitalized at their place and that from the blood tests it turns out that he suffers from Aids virus.

The video then cuts to an Israeli TV studio, where a commentator identified as Zvi Yehezkeli asserts that Kurdi had "admitted" that Arafat died of AIDS.
This is what Kurdi actually says:

The French doctors.. despite the fact that I spoke, that I asked to see any of them, or to hear from any of them, did not answer me. When President Yasser Arafat died, they sent me an email or an electronic letter, that Arafat had entered their hospital and after a blood test they found that he has the AIDS microbe.

The (mis)translation appears to suggest that Kurdi said Arafat "suffered from the Aids virus" not so subtely suggesting he had the illness called AIDS. Kurdi never used the word "suffered" he claimed only that Arafat "has the AIDS microbe" or virus based on a blood test. As everyone knows, having the HIV virus that causes AIDS, is not the same thing as "suffering from" AIDS.
But there's more. The video clip cuts Kurdi off in mid-sentence. We were unable to find a longer clip, however a 2005 Los Angeles Times article about an investigation into the causes of Arafat's death carried out jointly by The New York Times and Haaretz based on Arafat's medical records they said they had obtained states the following:

The Haaretz report, based on excerpts from a book by two Israeli journalists who obtained the records, cited experts who found evidence both for and against theories that Arafat was poisoned or had AIDS. The journalists, Avi Isacharoff and Amos Harel, said infection was also a possible cause.
Their account quoted Arafat's personal physician, Ashraf Kurdi, as saying that he knew French doctors had found evidence of acquired immune deficiency syndrome, though the medical report makes no mention of AIDS or of any tests having been performed to detect it. Specialists found it strange the records did not mention an AIDS test, given the suspicions.
Kurdi said he believed Arafat was injected with the human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS, to disguise the effects of poisoning, according to the account in Haaretz. Kurdi, who was not with Arafat in Paris, did not say why he believed French doctors had discovered evidence of AIDS.

In other words, Kurdi, who is being presented as "confirming" Arafat died of AIDS, is actually on record saying he believes Arafat was poisoned even though he was not anywhere near Arafat when he died. Was the video clip cut and translated in order to distort Kurdi's words?
But what is also strange is that Kurdi claims he received a written notification by email from French doctors. Where is this email, if it exists?

Arafat did not have HIV and did not die of AIDS

arafat_hiv_result_1.jpeg

Copies of Yasser Arafat's medical reports indicate multiple HIV tests that all returned negative results. (Al Jazeera English)


In the 50-minute Aljazeera documentary, reporter Clayton Swisher observes that "the most stubborn myth" surrounding Arafat "is that he died of AIDS."
But as Dr. David Barclay, the forensic expert whom Aljazeera commissioned to examine Arafat's medical records states, "He didn't have AIDS. They did two HIV tests, both of which were negative."

arafat_hiv_result_2.jpeg

Dr. Tawfik bin Shabaan, a Tunisian specialist of internal medicine. (Al Jazeera English)


"These French tests," Swisher states, "confirm the results of Dr. Tawfik bin Shaaban who was part of the Tunisian team treating Arafat in Ramallah."
"It is my speciality… HIV, It is my speciality," bin Shaaban tells Aljazeera, "There is absolutely no way he had HIV."
The lab results showing Arafat's negative HIV test were published by Aljazeera. As Aljazeera explained, the French doctors used pseudonyms Frederic Martipon and Etienne Louvet in order to maintain secrecy regarding Arafat's condition.

Zionists continue to spread the lie

While some dismiss the evidence presented by Aljazeera as mere conspiracy theory, some Zionist propagandists continue to spread lies about Arafat based on no evidence at all.
Ronny Naftaniel, for example, head of the Dutch Zionist organization CIDI, tweeted "it is said that there's a Romanian video showing Arafat having sex with his bodyguards. So cause of death was indeed Aids?" (Thanks to @Mariamkea for translation).

Embedded rich on Twitter

RonenBergman in Yediot: er zou een Roemense video bestaan die toont dat Arafat sex had met zijn lijfwachten. Aids dus toch doodsoorzaak?
Ronny Naftaniel (@RonnyNaftaniel) July 4, 2012

Naftaniel was citing an article in Ynet by Ronen Bergman that recycles and embellishes the noncredible claims from the Romanian memoir. In Bergman's version, the microphones become video cameras:

Ion Mihai Pacepa, the Romanian communist security chief who defected to the United States, claimed that his men shot a video of Arafat's room while he was the guest of Romanian ruler Ceausescu. In the images, Arafat was supposedly documented having sex with his bodyguards. Ariel Sharon told some of his close associates that Israel secured this videotape and considered the option of posting it on the Internet in order to shame Arafat.

Pacepa's book makes no mention of "videos" or "images" and that's understandable given that the events supposedly took place in the early 1970s.

Using homophobia to "shame" Arafat and Arabs

What's notable here is the reference to "shame." As Seymour Hersh (cited by Long) observed, the homophobic and orientalist-racist premise of the Arafat was gay' rumors is that Arab and Muslim men are particularly prone to sexual shaming, and that this alleged vulnerability can be used as a weapon against them, as it was used by American torturers at Abu Ghraib prison:

The notion that Arabs are particularly vulnerable to sexual humiliation became a talking point among pro-war Washington conservatives in the months before the March, 2003, invasion of Iraq. … [Patai's] book includes a twenty-five-page chapter on Arabs and sex, depicting sex as a taboo vested with shame and repression. "The segregation of the sexes, the veiling of the women … and all the other minute rules that govern and restrict contact between men and women, have the effect of making sex a prime mental preoccupation in the Arab world," Patai wrote. … The Patai book, an academic told me, was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behavior." In their discussions, he said, two themes emerged"one, that Arabs only understand force and, two, that the biggest weakness of Arabs is shame and humiliation."

"Outing Arafat"

Why should Arafat's sexuality be of interest to propagandists loyal to an Israeli "state" that is going to great pains to present itself as a haven of gay rights amid an ocean of intolerance and to attract gay tourists and their money to Tel Aviv?
According to former Israeli diplomat and current Israeli PR hack Lenny Ben-David, all these gay tourists are nothing more than "sexual deviants."
The lurid stories and lies about Arafat's sexual relationships aim to provoke homphobic reactions and marshal this homophobia to produce hostility and revulsion at Arafat, and to delegitimize him in the eyes of an Arab audience that is presumed to always be disgusted by such behavior.






These Israeli reactions belie Israel's "pink" marketing and expose the homphobia that exists at the heart of so much of its propaganda.

http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-...y-and-died

[Magda Hassan]

Not sure of the source.

Maybe Israel outsources? Or Palestinians outsource?

NEW EVIDENCE SUGGESTS KREMLIN POISONED ARAFAT

Former Soviet-bloc spy chief published theory before Swiss report

Published: 1 day ago

BBC video at this link
Does the newly publicized Swiss report of evidence Yasser Arafat was poisoned by radioactive polonium-210 indicate the Palestinian leader was killed by Russia's intelligence agency, the heir of the Soviet Union's KGB?
A little more than four months before the news this week that tests on Arafat's body in a Swiss investigation showed "unexpected high activity" of polonium, a book co-authored by former Romanian spy chief Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa was published documenting Arafat's training by the communist Soviet Union and pointing out that the only other known case of polonium-210 poisoning was the death of former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko in 2006.
After BBC News reported Wednesday the results of the Swiss forensic report obtained by the Middle East news agency al-Jazeera, Pacepa noted to WND that the British experts who investigated the assassination of Litvinenko found that the use of polonium-210 made Russia the most likely culprit.
The amount of polonium-210 used in the Litvinenko poisoning could come only from state-regulated nuclear reactors, and 97 percent of the world's legal plutonium is produced in Russia.
Pacepa's book "Disinformation," co-authored with historian and law professor Ronald Rychlak, and the companion feature-length film documentary of the same name show that the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Palestinian leader, Arafat, was actually a creation of the KGB.
Pacepa documents that Arafat a committed Marxist who became the father of modern terrorism was born in Egypt, not Jerusalem, revealing the KGB destroyed Arafat's original birth documents and created new ones.
Get "Disinformation: Former Spy Chief Reveals Secret Strategies for Undermining Freedom, Attacking Religion, and Promoting Terrorism" at WND's Superstore
Arafat's successor as president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, was educated in Moscow at a KGB-run school.
Pacepa, former head of Romania's foreign intelligence and top adviser to dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, points out that it was the poisoned Russian spy Litvenenko who revealed that al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri was trained by the KGB.
Arafat's official medical records say he died Nov. 11, 2004, at age 75 from a stroke resulting from a blood disorder. He had been flown to a French military hospital in Paris.
The report by experts at the Vaudois University Hospital Centre in Lausanne, Switzerland, who exhumed Arafat's body in November 2012, does not claim to be conclusive. The experts said the "unexpected high activity" of polonium found in specimens taken from Arafat's ribs, pelvis and soil that absorbed his bodily fluids "moderately" supported the poisoning theory.
Israel also has dismissed the Swiss investigation as "more soap opera than science."
BBC News noted many Palestinians have long believed that Israel poisoned Arafat while Israel has consistently denied any involvement.
There also have been allegations that he had AIDS or cancer.
The BBC said the findings of Palestinian, French and Russian teams that also analyzed samples have yet to be published by the Palestinian Authority
The Swiss report notes a lack of adequate biological specimens, and it cautions that the eight years between death and the investigation render detection subject to uncertainties.
Kremlin got rid of Arafat?
In their book, published June 25, Pacepa and Rychlak presented the theory that the Kremlin killed Arafat before the results of samples taken of Arafat's bones were known. At that time, traces of polonium-210 had been found on Arafat's personal effects.
"At the time of this writing, no one knows if Polonium-210 will be found in the samples of Arafat's bones taken from his exhumed body. Nevertheless, there is solid ground for postulating that the KGB/FSB may have gotten tired of Arafat and decided to get rid of him," they write in "Disinformation."
The authors note that Arafat fell violently ill in October 2004 at his compound while, similarly, Litvinenko suddenly fell ill and was hospitalized Nov. 1, 2006.
Litvinenko's illness was later attributed to poisoning with polonium-210, Pacepa and Rychlak write, a highly toxic isotope known to be used by the former Soviet Union as neutron trigger, or initiator, for nuclear weapons.
The BBC report this week noted a Russian Interfax news agency report quoting Vladimir Uiba, head of the Russian Federal Medico-Biological Agency. Uiba reportedly said Arafat "could not have been poisoned with polonium" and the test carried out by Russian experts "found no traces of this substance."
The Russian federal agency, however, later denied that Uiba had made any official statement on the findings.
The BBC cited Prof. Paddy Regan, an expert in radiation detection and measurement at the University of Surrey in the U.K., who said the Swiss scientists have made "a pretty strong statement."
"They are saying the hypothesis that Arafat was poisoned with polonium-210 is valid and has not been disproven by the data. However they cannot say definitively that he was murdered," he said.
Arafat's widow, Suha, had objected to a post-mortem at the time of the Palestinian leader's death, but she asked the Palestinian Authority to allow the exhumation last year "to reveal the truth."
She said the Swiss results revealed "a real crime, a political assassination."
"This has confirmed all our doubts. It is scientifically proved that he didn't die a natural death, and we have scientific proof that this man was killed," she said, according to BBC News.
Reuters said Arafat's wife didn't name any suspects and acknowledged her husband had many enemies.
Yigal Palmor of Israel's foreign ministry argued the investigations had been commissioned by "interested parties," Arafat's widow and the Palestinian Authority, who had "never bothered" to look for some key data.
"The other huge hole in the theory is the absence of all access to the French hospital where Arafat died and to Arafat's medical files," Palmor said, according to BBC News.
"How can the cause of death be determined without the opinion of the doctors or the results of the medical tests they ran on the patient?
"Israel doesn't feel concerned in the least."
Reagan's bible'
After a crisis of conscience, Pacepa defected to the United States in 1978 and became a critical asset to American intelligence services. He was debriefed by the FBI and others for many years.
Pacepa, who still lives in the U.S. under a CIA-protective identity due to active assassination threats against his life, was credited by the CIA as the only person in the Western world who single-handedly demolished an entire enemy espionage service the one he himself managed.
When he was naturalized as an American citizen in 1988, the CIA credited Pacepa with making "an important and unique contribution to the United States of which you can be justly proud."

President Ronald Reagan reportedly referred to Pacepa's first book, "Red Horizons," as "my bible for dealing with dictators."

http://www.wnd.com/2013/11/new-evidence-...ed-arafat/

[Magda Hassan]

Then there is this from 2004 six months before Arafat died.

Sharon Says His Pledge Not to Harm Arafat No Longer Holds

By ELISSA GOOTMAN
Published: April 24, 2004
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Friday that he no longer considered himself bound by his pledge not to harm Yasir Arafat, his most explicit statement yet that he might take action against the Palestinian leader.
Mr. Sharon acceded three years ago to President Bush's request not to physically harm Mr. Arafat. But in an interview on Israel's Channel 2 television on Friday night, Mr. Sharon said he told Mr. Bush during their White House meeting last week that ''this commitment of mine no longer exists.''
When asked if that meant physically harming Mr. Arafat, Mr. Sharon replied, ''I do not think this matter can be made any clearer.'' The Israeli leader did not say how Mr. Bush responded.
The contention that Israel was free of any commitment not to kill Mr. Arafat was rejected by Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on Friday.

''The president made it clear that he would oppose any such attempts against Mr. Arafat, and the president firmly believes that he has a commitment from Prime Minister Sharon that no such attempt will be made,'' Mr. Powell said on the ABC News program ''Nightline.''

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/24/world/...holds.html

[Magda Hassan]

Worth the watch.
It will be interesting to see what France does with this since it is now in their jurisdiction. Looks conclusive that he was murdered by polonium 201 Russian test not worth considering by the looks of it.
Russia and Palestinian leadership have something to answer for as well. The US and Israel are keeping Palestine out of the International Criminal Court so it cannot be heard there.

Poor Palestinians. Nobody helps them. Even their own leaders.

n the latest film from Al Jazeera's Investigation's unit, Palestinian officials admit that they had suspected poisoning as the cause of Arafat's sudden illness in 2004, contrary to their public statements.


Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat tells Al Jazeera that he called the US Consul General in Jerusalem and pleaded with him, "Please, President Arafat's health is deteriorating. We suspect he was poisoned. So please, if you can contact the Israelis and get us the antidote, we will appreciate it."
The film follows the exhumation of the Palestinian leader's body from its resting place in Ramallah to Switzerland, where scientists found at least 18 times the normal levels of radioactive polonium in his remains. The report, was released last week.
Killing Arafat also shows how Al Jazeera's Investigation's team was placed under tight surveillance by Palestinian Authority security forces during the production of the documentary.
The widow's take
In the documentary, Yasser Arafat's widow, Suha Arafat, calls on the Palestinian Authority to halt peace talks with Israel.
Speaking immediately after hearing the results of the Swiss report, she says, "I think the Palestinian Authority has to go till the end to know the truth about it. And I think they have to stop any kind of negotiations with Israel until they know what's going on."
Earlier in the film, Nasser Qudwa, Arafat's nephew and former Palestinian Authority foreign minister, is asked why an autopsy was not performed on Arafat upon his death in 2004.
"If this had happened, I would think that it would have meant the end of the peace process as it stood at that time,"he tells Al Jazeera, "because the Palestinian people would have seen with their own eyes a huge betrayal and a big crime committed against them, a crime of killing their own leader."


International Criminal Court
Palestinian officials have said on several occasions that they will take the case of Yasser Arafat's suspicious death to the International Criminal Court.
Immediately after the exhumation on November 27, 2012, the head of the Palestinian committee investigating his death, Tawfik Tirawi, repeated that claim. "All the existing investigations are looking for evidence, in order to take whoever is behind this assassination to the International Criminal Court."
But in April this year, the Palestinian Authority agreed to halt its application to join the ICC. It was a concession to Israel, negotiated in Washington, DC, during a meeting between the Arab League and US diplomats.
The move was intended to help Israel and the Palestinians resume peace talks. But it also means that any attempt to bring the case of Yasser Arafat's poisoning to the Hague remains possible only in the distant future.
'A heavy day'
The documentary also features exclusive footage of the night of the exhumation and testimony from the only man allowed to touch Yasser Arafat's body during the procedure.
Dr Saber Al Aloul, a Palestinian pathologist, extracted 60 samples from the Palestinian's leader's remains. "It was a very difficult and heavy day for all of us," he said.
"The moment I touched the body of Yasser Arafat, I remembered his forehead. I was at medical school when I met him for the first time. I kissed him on his forehead."
The pathologist, whose training was funded in part by the Arafat's Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO), talks of his pride in being able "to deliver the truth to him, our leader, symbol and father, and also to the Palestinian people and to the world."
"I felt honoured to be involved in this process," he told Al Jazeera.

Russian results questions
The documentary also reveals the results of a Russian scientific study, performed in parallel to the Swiss research, which yielded inconclusive results.
In the film, a source tells Al Jazeera the scientists in Moscow received specific instructions from the Russian Foreign Ministry on how to carry out the study.
"It seemed suspicious to them that they were being asked to fill out a specific table and answer specific questions from the Foreign Ministry. Namely, to conduct an inferior study," the source said.
Professor David Barclay, a leading forensic scientist, said the Russian results were "meaningless". The Russians measured just four of 20 samples received, two from the skull and two from "extremity bones".
Professor Barclay described the choice of samples for testing as "very odd" and says, "the levels they've got appear to be 10 or 20 times less than you'd expect just from anybody else in the world."
Viewing this video from your mobile? Click here

http://www.aljazeera.com/investigations/...41864.html

[Peter Lemkin]

My, what a tangled web has been woven. Russia, which produces 97% of the World's Po-210 and has used it at least once before to murder someone they wanted 'gone', purposely flubbed their exam of the autopsy materials given them! They tested only a small % of them [on orders from someone 'high up'] and found an unbelievable LESS Po-210 than is considered 'background'. Simply an impossible finding - and IMO making Russia look like a candidate as guilty party or co-conspirator. Israel is the 'natural' to look to for culpability for many reasons...and they are wheeling out the disinformation machinery about Arafat, in general - making them look more suspicious, as well. Then there were/are those in the PA who were always in opposition to an exhumation and testing [why?!]; now they are opposed to any commission of inquiry as to who did it [why?!] - and they look like they might have something to hide. There could be others too. The French are a little suspect of a cover-up as they threw away many materials and records of the doctors who treated him at the time of his illness and death [why?!] - a very strange, even suspect thing, in the case of a head of state dying so strangely. Untangling this one and finding the real culprits will take a Sherlock Holmes. Everyone looks guilty to some extent. As Magda said, poor Palestinians, they seem to have no friends and are just being played for pawns in a larger game on the Grand Chessboard........

Po-210 is a really frightening poison - for EVEN IF one knows that they have been poisoned with it, there is NO KNOWN antidote or cure - no way to remove it from the body [and it only takes about the amount the size of a period done with a ball point pen]. If you have it in you - you will die painfully and soon. Period.

[David Guyatt]

Everyone looks guilty to some extent.

Perhaps they all are guilty to some extent. Looks to me like a man who's time had come - if this many enemies are lining up to lie about him.

[Magda Hassan]

I think there is a part 3 coming from Al Jazeera which will take this further.

Plus the journalist behind all story this is ex (sic) State department which may mean nothing or may mean many things.

Well all of those heads of state need to take note how little polonium it takes and how easily concealed it is and have another look at their nearest and dearest. And the waiter. And the hotel cleaner. And the body guard. I could be them too. Just.like.that. It opens the way for it to happen to all if it is done to one. Arafat was not powerful a man after all. Or was he?

Abbas is such a pliant Israeli quisling and he seems fine about the investigation. Clearly the Russians less so and some of the Palestinians are very queasy for various possible reasons. Israel knows everyone will think of them first, but they aren't owning this one while they have others. And it may well be them alone or in partnership. But with whom? The Russians? A Russian? A Russian/Israeli? An Israeli American with Israeli Russian connections? Some one with access to polonium. Suha wants to know what happened to her husband and expose the murderer who ever that is. But she can't be unaware of the politics involved in the cover up.

[Magda Hassan]

Everyone looks guilty to some extent.

Perhaps they all are guilty to some extent. Looks to me like a man who's time had come - if this many enemies are lining up to lie about him.

Everyone is guilty. They have all shafted the Palestinians for decades. No one has called out the elephant in the room. Looks like Arafat's death has to be covered up to stop noticing that elephant.