Suha Arafat mocks death claims

Suha Arafat, wife of former Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, has denied fresh claims surrounding her husband’s mysterious death, after Israel’s Channel 10 aired a report on the ongoing investigation last night. Arafat dismissed the programme’s content as containing “silly accusations” which worked to serve Israel’s interests. The Channel 10 programme denied any Israeli involvement in Arafat’s 2004 death, after a nine-month Al Jazeera investigation previously revealed high traces of “unsupported” polonium-210 in the Palestinian leader’s clothing worn at the time he died. The report was published following tests carried out by scientists at the Institut de Radiophysique in Lausanne, Switzerland. “Evidence has proved that Israel worked to kill my husband,” Arafat claimed. The Palestinian leader’s widow also rubbished claims that Arafat had been infected with AIDS, a claim categorically denied by Al Jazeera’s report. “The Israelis are confused,” Arafat argued. “They know that the French judiciary is going to issue a report about the cause of death so they are distracting attention away from it.” Israeli activist Uri Avneri meanwhile claimed that Israel was responsible for Arafat’s death, adding that the makers of the Channel 10 documentary aimed at “fostering scepticism” over the Swiss laboratory’s investigation into potentially fatal polonium traces found on Arafat’s clothing, tissue samples and toothbrush. Palestinian sources have claimed the controversial programme has not provided any new information. Channel 10 revealed repeated attempts by Israel to assassinate the divisive Palestinian leader, one of which failed in Sudan. Arafat’s wife has renewed her commitment to “achieving the objectives for which her husband was killed.” Yasser Arafat died in the Percy military hospital, west of Paris, on November 11 2004. Polonium-210 was the same radioactive chemical which killed Russian dissident, Alexander Litvinenko, in London in 2006.