Muhammad Abd ar-Rahman Abd ar-Rauf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini

leader of a terrorist organization

Arafat, Yasser(Muhammad Abdel Rauf al-Qudwa al-Husseini, nickname - Abu-Amar, English. Yasser Arafat; 1929, Cairo, - 2004, Paris, buried in Ramallah) - head of the Palestinian Authority, chairman central committee organization Fatah and chairman of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization.

early years

Regarding the exact date and place of Arafat's birth, the opinions of Palestinian biographers differ, with some claiming that he was born in Jerusalem, others in Gaza. Arafat was from a wealthy family who moved to Cairo from Gaza for economic reasons. Apparently, he was related to the famous Arab Husseini family.

In 1951, Arafat entered Cairo University, where he studied engineering. According to his own testimony, in 1951 Arafat became one of the founders of the union of Palestinian students in Cairo, whose main goal was to support the "all-Palestinian government" organized by the former Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini. AT student years Arafat maintained close ties with members of the Muslim Brotherhood organization - ardent opponents of Egyptian President G. A. Nasser.

Beginning of terrorist activity

Arafat graduated from the university in 1956 and at the same time, to participate in the Sinai campaign, joined the Egyptian army. A year later, he was expelled from Egypt, along with other leading members of the Palestinian student union, due to ties with the Muslim Brotherhood. He went to Kuwait where he worked as a road engineer for about a year.

Fatah

The date of the first significant achievement of Arafat is also controversial - the creation of the Fatah organization together with another former leader of the student union Abu Iyad. According to the most common version, Fatah was founded in 1959 in Kuwait, where Arafat was a successful building contractor.

Fatah was the first organization of the Palestinian Arabs, intending to seize Palestine for themselves, and not for another Arab state (Syria, Jordan, Egypt). She used terror tactics to draw the Arab countries into war with Israel.

December 31, 1964 - January 1, 1965, Fatah militants made the first sortie into Israel. They tried to blow up the aqueduct that supplied fresh water from the Sea of ​​Galilee to half of Israel.

Fatah became a rival of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) founded in 1964 and an opponent of its patron G. A. Nasser. Fatah cooperated with the Syrian regime (hostile to Nasser) in terror against Israel since 1963, but especially after the 1966 Baathist left coup. This contributed to the aggravation of the Arab-Israeli conflict, which resulted in the Six Day War.

The defeat of the Arab armies in this war prompted the PLO to intensify terrorist activities inside Israel, in the controlled territories and in other countries. After an unsuccessful attempt to organize resistance in Israeli-controlled territories, Arafat was forced to flee. In 1968, Fatah became part of the PLO. Arafat became the leader of the PLO and in February 1969 was elected chairman of its executive committee.

Attempted takeover of Jordan

By that time, most groups of Palestinian terrorists were concentrated in the Jordanian capital Amman and other cities that were not reached by Israeli artillery shells. From there they crossed the border and attacked people in Israel.

On March 21, 1968, Israel carried out an operation to destroy the Fatah central base in the village of Karameh. Arafat fled, and the Tzahal suffered heavy losses due to the intervention of the Jordanian army on the side of the terrorists.

Arafat then formed his standard tactics: the actions he needed were carried out by "radical PLO factions" that he formally did not control, which he condemned, but did not stop. With great effort, King Hussein of Jordan succeeded in the summer of 1971 in defeating the military forces of the PLO and expelling them from the country.

Action in Lebanon

Having suffered a military defeat, Arafat tried to strengthen the political status of his organization. He forged strong ties with Soviet Union, with the Eastern bloc and at the same time with the conservative Arab states that became rich as a result of the 1973 oil crisis.

The help of these allies forced Arafat to show the first signs of political moderation: in June 1974, he persuaded the PLO to adopt a plan for the "phased liberation of Palestine", which involved a temporary tactical refusal to completely destroy the State of Israel.

An important political success of Arafat was his speech at the UN General Assembly in November 1974, which provided Soviet support for the idea of ​​convening an international conference with the participation of the PLO and large subsidies from the Arab oil monarchies.

But in Lebanon in April 1975, another Civil War with the participation of Syria, which had its own "clients" among Palestinian terrorist organizations - competitors of Fatah. Being active participants in this war, Arafat and the PLO lost all their international successes.

Syrian troops sought to destroy Arafat's remaining forces in Lebanon. As a cover, he organized the kidnapping of Soviet agents in Beirut, whom he "helped free" and earned the support of the Soviet leadership, who protected him from Syria.

The signing of a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt in March 1979 further worsened the position of Arafat and his organization. But he continued to enjoy the political support of the Soviet bloc and the financial assistance of the conservative Arab states, which allowed him to proceed with the creation of a semi-regular army in southern Lebanon.

Subsequently, as a result of the defeat of the PLO in the Lebanese war, Arafat was forced to leave Lebanon with the bulk of his forces and settle in [Tunisia] (December 1982).

Terror

From the late 1960s to the start of the intifada total number victims of terror amounted to about 4,000 Israelis (and it is not known how many others in different countries), including 700 killed; most of whom are civilians, including children (for example, when the school in Maalot was taken over).

At the same time, several processes took place that radically worsened the situation around the world:

In Tunisia

Arafat missed an opportunity to enlist US support by refusing, during negotiations with Jordan (1985–86), to recognize UN Security Council Resolution 242, according to which all states have the right to live in peace.

In December 1987, the first intifada began, organized by activists "on the ground" (in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip), but quickly taken under the control of the PLO. In November 1988, Arafat proclaimed the independence of Arab Palestine, of which he was appointed the governing body of the PLO.

In 1990, Arafat married Suha Tawiel. In 1995, their daughter was born.

In 1990, Arafat approved of the actions of Iraq, which captured Kuwait, which caused condemnation Western countries and the oil monarchies that stopped funding the PLO. A heavy blow for Arafat and the PLO was the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But the peace process launched by the Madrid Conference (September 1991), in which a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation took part, opened up new opportunities for Arafat.

The emergence of the Palestinian Authority

In early 1993, the new head of the Israeli government, I. Rabin, decided to enter into secret negotiations with the PLO through the mediation of the Norwegian government. They ended with the signing in Washington by I. Rabin and Arafat of the Declaration of Principles (September 1993), in which Israel recognized the PLO as the "representative of the Palestinians", and the PLO recognized the State of Israel and its right to live in peace.

The formation of a temporary Palestinian autonomy for a period of five years was envisaged; the details and ways of implementing the project were determined by a series of agreements reached in Taba in May 1994 and September 1995. According to the first, a Palestinian administration was established in Gaza, Jericho and their environs; according to the second, its jurisdiction was extended to six cities in the West Bank with their adjacent territories.

January 20, 1996 Arafat was elected president ( rice) Palestinian National Authority (PNA).

Immediately after the start of the implementation of the agreement, terror intensified sharply, moving from isolated attacks with cold weapons to blowing up buses and shooting. After the election of a new Israeli government in 1996, Arafat staged an explosion of terror, which included his official militias. US President Clinton organized a meeting between Arafat and Netanyahu on October 23, 1998, at which a memorandum was adopted outlining the steps of both sides to implement the agreements. It had no practical value.

A final agreement was to be reached by May 1999, but negotiations between Arafat and Israel stalled. Arafat insisted on a return to the 1967 borders, Palestinian sovereignty in Jerusalem, and the "right of return" of the Palestinian refugees, conditions absolutely unacceptable to Israel.

The terror and (later) fighting against the Israeli forces involved members of the official armed structures Palestinian Authority. For the first time, Arab citizens of Israel were widely involved in terror and unrest.

Terror was directed mainly against civilians in Israeli settlements in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip and inside the Green Line. In cases where the terrorists were detained by the security forces of the autonomy (or they received them from the Israeli security forces), they were quickly released. The Palestinian Charter's clause to destroy Israel was never really repealed, contrary to the donkey agreement.

Arafat showed a clear unwillingness to end the terror. This became an argument in the dispute about the need to continue negotiations with him and the very existence of autonomy, since it refuted the thesis about his moderation compared to possible alternatives(extremists).

The only thing that supported the "peace process" was inertia, the hope of a part of the Israeli population for positive dynamics and the pressure of the international diplomatic circles involved in this project. The abrupt end of the "Oslo process" could cause a political crisis.

When the intensity of the terror outweighed this argument as well, Operation Protective Wall was carried out, as a result of which Arafat was effectively removed from power. Under pressure from the Israeli government and the world community, he introduced the post of prime minister in the autonomy and on March 11, 2003, transferred real powers to Abu Mazen, who occupied it.

Death

In October 2004, Arafat's illness worsened and he was sent to Paris for treatment. There he fell into a coma and on November 11, 2004 was disconnected from life support devices. official reason death is a stroke.

Arafat's coffin was moved to Ramallah with a stopover in Cairo. Arafat's mausoleum was built in Ramallah in 2007.

Various Palestinian politicians periodically accuse Israel of poisoning Arafat, sometimes extending this accusation to their opponents within Palestinian society.

After the latest series of such allegations in 2012, Arafat's corpse was exhumed and sent for examination to Switzerland. The full results of the examination, as of September 2013, have not yet been received.

stolen money

From the materials of various audits (in particular, the audit of the IMF), it is known that Arafat took away billions of dollars that came through various channels to finance terrorist organizations, help the Palestinians and financial investments in the Palestinian autonomy. Money different ways transferred to accounts controlled personally by Arafat.

Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat died on the morning of Thursday, November 11, in the French military hospital Percy near Paris. On Friday, the body of Yasser Arafat was taken to Cairo, where an official farewell ceremony was held with the participation of Arab leaders, foreign delegations and the Palestinian leadership. He was then taken to the West Bank city of Ramallah, where the Palestinian leader was buried.

Yasser Arafat ( full name Muhammad abd ar-Ra "uf al-Qudwah al-Husseini) was born on August 4, 1929 in Jerusalem, in the family of a wealthy merchant. Arafat's mother - Zahwa Abu Saud al-Husseini - came from a noble Jerusalem family, dating back to the prophet Muhammad himself, she died when Arafat was four years old.

At the age of 17, Yasser participated in the illegal delivery of weapons to Palestine to fight the British and the Jews who formalized their statehood. In 1948 he began to participate in the armed struggle.

Having received the rank of lieutenant of the Egyptian army, Arafat in 1956 participated in repelling the onslaught of the Anglo-French-Israeli forces on the Suez Canal nationalized by President Nasser. Yasser then received an engineering degree from the University of Cairo and moved to Kuwait, where he worked in the construction business.

Business did not become his main occupation - he headed the Movement for the Liberation of Palestine group. Initially, it was called HATF, but the abbreviation resembled the Arabic word for "defeat", and the extreme letters were reversed. Therefore, in 1959, Fatah emerged, and the leader got the battle name Abu Ammar ("Creator", "Giver of longevity").

In 1964, Arafat led a guerrilla war against Israel in Jordan. In the same year, the League of Arab States (LAS) created the Palestine Liberation Organization, designed to unite the Palestinians under the slogan of "fighting the Zionist occupiers." In part, this Arab League decision was directed against the growing influence of Fatah.

After the defeat of the Arabs in the 1967 war, Arafat put forward the slogan: "Not Arab unity is the path to Palestine, but Palestine is the path to Arab unity." After 1967, Arafat moved to Jordan. After the 1969 Jordanian war, he moved the PLO headquarters to Beirut, where he remained until 1982. When Beirut was abandoned, the PLO headquarters moved to Tunisia.

By 1969, the Palestine National Council (parliament in exile) proclaimed Arafat chairman of the PLO executive committee, and then commander-in-chief of the forces of the Palestinian revolution. Under the leadership of Arafat, the PLO became an independent organization with its own troops and administration. The PLO operated in Jordan, Lebanon, Tunisia. According to the Israelis, the PLO carried out about two thousand attacks against the Israelis against them.

In 1988, at a special session of the UN General Assembly, Arafat rejected terrorism and recognized the "right to live in peace" for all participants in the Middle East conflict, including Palestine and Israel. This speech by Arafat and the mediation of the world powers paved the way for the Oslo Accords in 1993. After signing the "Declaration of Principles" with Israel, Arafat, proclaimed president of the non-existent state of Palestine in 1989, shook hands with the prime minister of Israel for the first time.

A month later, Yasser Arafat became the head of the PNA in the West Bank of the Jordan and the Gaza Strip. A year later, he, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Several assassination attempts were made on Arafat. In 1970, violent clashes broke out in Jordan between Palestinian resistance groups and the Jordanian army, resulting in casualties on both sides. It was then that he escaped death for the first time.

In 1973, Arafat survived an assassination attempt in Lebanon by an Israeli special forces group that included future Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. As a result of the operation, three assistants to the Palestinian leader were killed.

In 1982, Israeli aircraft bombed targets in Beirut where the Palestinian leader was believed to be. Hundreds of civilians were killed in the raids, but Arafat remained safe and sound. As the Israelis admit, snipers repeatedly held Arafat's headscarf in the crosshairs of the sights, but there was no command to open fire.

Under international protection On August 21, 1982, he was taken from Lebanon to Tunisia, where the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), headed by Arafat, settled until 1994.

Despite the fact that Arafat was thousands of kilometers from Palestine, the Israelis did not stop trying to get to the Palestinian leader and his associates. In October 1985, Israeli aircraft bombed the office of Yasser Arafat and the PLO bureau in the capital of Tunisia. Arafat remained unharmed this time, although dozens of people died as a result of the raid.

In 1991, at the height of the Persian Gulf crisis, Arafat was involved in a car accident. His car, which was traveling along the Amman-Baghdad highway, overturned several times. Arafat survived. In 1992, in the Libyan desert, Yasser Arafat's personal plane crashed while flying from Khartoum to Tripoli. Arafat was on the list of the dead, preparations were already underway for memorial prayers, when he showed up unexpectedly for everyone. Arafat was taken to the hospital with minor injuries, from which he recovered two days later. He was the only one who survived that plane crash.

Arafat married at the age of 60. "My wife is a Palestinian revolution," he joked before marrying his economic adviser, Sukhoi Tawiil, a 25-year-old Orthodox Christian who converted to Islam for the love of her husband. Nine years ago, Yasser and Suha Arafat had a daughter, Zahwa, named after Abu Ammar's mother.

According to RIA Novosti

Yasser Arafat is one of the most famous radical political figures of the second half of the 20th century. His life and work received and, obviously, will always receive extremely controversial assessments, while for some Arafat is a fighter for independence and national liberation, and for others - worst enemy, a murderer and a terrorist, as he organized attacks against the civilian population. Yasser Arafat is politician who practically managed to turn non-state violence into a legitimate form of political struggle. The PLO organization headed by him was admitted to the UN as an observer, and Arafat himself was met in different countries as the head of state.

Biography

early years

Yasser Arafat was the fifth child of a wealthy fabric merchant from Gaza. Arafat himself said that he was from Jerusalem, like his mother, and that he was born on August 4, however, according to the documents, he was still born in Cairo on August 24, 1929. Perhaps the parents recorded Cairo as the place of birth in order to give the child the opportunity to study and work in Egypt. According to another point of view, Arafat, who was born in Cairo, called Jerusalem the city of his birth in order to “become closer” with the future capital of his state.

At birth, he received the name "Muhammad abd ar-Rahman ar-Rauf al-Qudwa al-Husseini." In his youth, he changed it to the current one - Yasser Arafat (Yasir means "easy"). This was done for a specific purpose: he did not want to be somehow associated with the commander of the Palestinian forces, Abdel Qader al-Husseini, who was blamed for the defeat of the Arabs in the first war against the Israelis. The fact is that Arafat, after graduating from the Lyceum, worked as the personal secretary of Abdel al-Husseini.

When Arafat was four years old, his mother died and he was transferred to Jerusalem, where the family lived near the Western Wall and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, located inside the Temple Mount complex - the place where biblical times was the Jewish Temple. At that time, the entire complex was under the control of local Muslim authorities, but numerous Jewish residents of Jerusalem demanded the establishment of their own control over the Temple Mount. The father married several more times, and in 1937 the family returned to Cairo. Arafat was brought up by his older sister Inam - according to her, already in childhood, his favorite pastime was to command his peers.

During the Arab-Israeli war of 1947-1949, when there was an exodus of Palestinian Arabs (nakba, catastrophe (Ar.)), and thousands of Arabs left their homes, Arafat himself lived in Egypt, but considered Palestine his homeland. He had long been interested in Zionist issues - he was familiar with the writings of Theodor Herzl and other Zionist theorists, as evidenced by the articles that Arafat published in the Our Palestine magazine. Arafat later liked to repeat:

Already at the age of 17, Yasser Arafat participated in the illegal delivery of weapons to Palestine to fight the British and Jews and was engaged in revolutionary agitation. In 1948, during the war, Arafat dropped out of school, took up arms and, along with other Palestinians, tried to move to their homeland, but they were disarmed and stopped by the Egyptians, who refused to let untrained students into the war zone. Arafat, angered by the "betrayal" of the fraternal Arab states, joined the Muslim Brotherhood, and from 1952 to 1956 headed the League of Palestinian Students. In student disputes, he called the refusal of the Arab countries to partition Palestine in accordance with the resolution of the UN General Assembly a mistake. He believed that not the Arab countries, but the Palestinians themselves should take care of their future.

Yasser Arafat graduated from the Faculty of Engineering at Cairo University.

In 1956, with the rank of lieutenant in the Egyptian army, he participated in repelling the attack of the Anglo-French-Israeli forces on the Suez Canal nationalized by President Nasser.

It was in 1956 that he was first seen wearing the traditional Bedouin headscarf (keffiyeh), which until the end of his life became a symbol of Palestinian resistance.

Fatah and the PLO

In 1956, Arafat moved to Kuwait, where by that time there was a thriving Palestinian community. There he entered the construction business, in which he excelled. But his true calling was the Palestinian revolution. He decided for himself that “only the Palestinians themselves can liberate Palestine” and it is not worth counting only on the help of other Arab countries. In the early 1950s, scattered detachments of fedayeen were already operating from the territory of Egypt, but there was no single resistance structure, organization, headquarters that would coordinate the struggle of the Palestinians for independence. Arafat took it upon himself to create such an organization.

In 1957, in Kuwait, he participated in the creation, and then led the "Movement for the Liberation of Palestine" (Fatah). The majority in the movement at that time were Palestinian refugees who initially settled in the Gaza Strip, studied at Cairo and Beirut universities and worked in various Arab countries.

Initially, the group was called "Hatf", but this abbreviation resembled the Arabic word for "defeat", and therefore it was written backwards. Thus, in 1959, Fatah (“conquest”, “victory”) arose. At the same time, Yasser Arafat received the party nickname "Abu Ammar".

December 31, 1964 - January 1, 1965 "Fatah" committed the first terrorist attack in Israel, trying to blow up the aqueduct, which supplied half of Israel with fresh water from the Kinneret Lake. The Palestinians consider this date the beginning of the armed struggle for the creation of their state.

Arafat turned to the League of Arab States (LAS) for help, arguing that the strength of the Arabs is in unity, and money, weapons, people, and bases are needed for unification and armed struggle. In 1964, the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was created with the funds of the Arab League as a political organization uniting all organizations of the Palestinian resistance, striving for the common goal of "the liberation of Palestine and the creation of an independent Palestinian state." According to some reports, the PLO was originally created by the leaders of the Arab countries in opposition to Fatah, which was gaining popularity in those years. They created the PLO in order to keep the Palestinian national movement under control.

After the defeat of regular Arab armies in the Six Day War (1967), the Israelis launched an offensive against Palestinian militants, and Yasser Arafat fled to Jordan (according to some reports, he crossed the border dressed in a woman's dress).

On March 18, 1968, a bus with children was blown up on a mine in the Eilat region, laid by saboteurs from the Jordanian side of the border, two people died; On March 21, Israeli troops, including aviation, tanks and artillery, opposed Fatah units based in the Jordanian village of al-Karama. As a result of the battle, Al-Karameh was almost completely destroyed. Despite high losses among the Arabs, Fatah supporters believe that Fatah won, because the Israeli army, which has aircraft and heavy equipment, received a fitting rebuff and was forced to retreat. In a situation of complete despondency that reigned after the devastating defeat of the Arabs in the Six Day War, the battle in al-Karama made of Arafat national hero who dared to oppose Israel. In Israel, by contrast, the operation was considered a failure and was criticized. The authority of Fatah grew, with dozens of young Arabs joining its ranks. Not surprisingly, a year later, Arafat became the recognized leader of the PLO.

By the end of the 1960s, Fatah, having merged with the PLO, occupied a central place in it, and at the Palestinian National Congress in Cairo on February 3, 1969, Arafat was elected leader of the PLO, replacing Ahmed Shukairi. Two years later, Arafat became the commander-in-chief of the forces of the "Palestinian Revolution", and in 1973 he headed the political committee of the PLO.

It was during these years that he began to build a structure that later proved its effectiveness. Arafat creates both a "military" and a "political" wing of the organization. From now on, the Israelis formally deal with politicians, leaders of the national liberation movement, fighting for the freedom and independence of their people.

After the events of "Black September" in 1970, when his people unsuccessfully tried to remove the Jordanian King Hussein, Arafat moved to Lebanon. By this time, he begins to cooperate with the Soviet special services. The PLO receives financial and military support from the USSR, the militants are trained in military affairs by instructors from the special services of the countries of the Warsaw Pact, here they are provided with forged documents and the wounded soldiers are treated in closed medical institutions. With the money of the USSR and - later - rich Saudi Arabia Arafat creates a "state within a state" in southern Lebanon.

According to journalist Veniamin Ginodman:

Jordan

The Jordanian period of Yasser Arafat's life lasted three years. During this time, the Palestinians turned the kingdom into their main springboard, from where they regularly attacked Israel. Amman Airport regularly hosted airliners hijacked by Palestinians from international airlines, shaping the image of Jordan as a hotbed of terrorism

King Hussein's attempts to pacify the Palestinians were unsuccessful. Yasser Arafat's main trump card was several hundred thousand refugees who found shelter in Jordan, whom he threatened to arm and throw against the royal army if something happened. Refugee camps controlled by armed Palestinian groups have become a kind of state within a state. The Palestinians captured several strategic points.

In June 1970, the confrontation between the Jordanian authorities and the Palestinians and attempts to disarm the Palestinian militia escalated into an armed conflict.

Other Arab governments tried to find a peaceful solution to the conflict, but the ongoing actions of Palestinian militants in Jordanian territory (such as the destruction of three airliners hijacked from international airlines and kept in the desert south of Amman) forced the Jordanian authorities to take extreme repressive measures. On September 16, King Hussein declared martial law in the country. On the same day, Arafat became commander-in-chief of the Palestine Liberation Army, the military wing of the PLO. A civil war began, during which the PLO actively supported Syria, which sent 200 tanks to Jordan. The US and Israel were also ready to get involved in the conflict between the Jordanian army and the Palestinians: the US sent its Sixth Fleet to the Eastern Mediterranean, and Israel was ready to provide military assistance to Jordan. By September 24, the Jordanian regular army had the upper hand over the PLO, and about 5 thousand militants were killed during the clashes. Arafat was forced to flee to Lebanon. After these events, the Jordanian king became Arafat's personal enemy.

Arafat and Palestinian terror in the 70s and 80s

For a decade and a half, Yasser Arafat issued orders that resulted in thousands of deaths. In just 30 years between 1964 and 1994, 866 Israelis were killed by Palestinian terrorists, including those not affiliated with the PLO. PLO militants and groups not controlled by it seized regular buses and schools in Israel, detonated bombs in squares and institutions, hunted Israelis and their sympathizers around the world, hijacked planes, took hostages.

After being expelled from Jordan, Arafat relocated the PLO to Lebanon. The weakness of the Lebanese government allowed the PLO to create a practically independent Palestinian state on the territory of this state. Palestinian militants from Lebanese territory carried out raids against military and civilian facilities in Israel, and the Israeli army and aircraft attacked Palestinian positions and refugee camps.

In 1972, members of the Black September group captured 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics and destroyed all the hostages while trying to free them. This crime caused the condemnation of the entire world community; Arafat publicly declared that the PLO was not involved in such attacks.

In 1974, the PLO continued to strike at the civilian population of Israel. Some of the attacks included the capture of Israelis and Jewish citizens of other countries in order to exchange them for Palestinian prisoners, but after 1968 such actions did not lead to anything. In the course of attempts to free the hostages by Israeli special forces, some of the hostages died, and the invaders were destroyed. In other cases, the terrorists simply opened fire on Israeli civilians without making any demands.

In the late 1970s, numerous left-wing Palestinian organizations sprang up to attack civilian purposes both in Israel itself and outside it[specify]; many of them were not members of the PLO or withdrew from it. Arafat denied any involvement in the attacks, explaining that the attacks were the work of the "military wing" of the PLO or organizations that are not part of it, which consist of young hot people, avengers who lost friends and relatives in the war with the "Zionist enemies", that is extreme extremists who cannot always be controlled. At the same time, he offered to negotiate with the political wing of the PLO, most of which gave Europeans and Americans the impression of moderate, civilized, European educated people, sober politicians who are willing to sit down at the negotiating table.

Thus, according to a number of sources, directing the terrorist activities of Fatah, its youth group Fatah Hawks, as well as the Black September and PFLP (People's Front for the Liberation of Palestine) groups, according to some sources who officially broke with the PLO, Arafat simultaneously seeks to become a legitimate, recognized politician. Some sources believe that this approach was later adopted from Arafat by Northern Irish and Basque extremists, leftist movements in Latin America, Africa, Nepalese Maoists and many others.

Arafat is said to have spent millions of dollars in the 1970s propagating the ideas of a "Palestinian revolution" among Western students. Financing funds are being created and public support"the struggle of the Palestinian people".

Arafat at the UN

In 1974, a new political program The PLO, which called for fighting for the creation of a Palestinian state "not instead of, but along with Israel," that is, in the West Bank of the Jordan River and in the Gaza Strip. After that, the PLO was recognized by more than a hundred states, and its leader became central figure on the Middle East political scene.

As a result of the adoption of a program that provides for readiness to recognize Israel, and also using the broad world support for the struggle of the Palestinians for the creation of their own state, Arafat becomes the first representative of a non-governmental organization to speak at the plenary session of the UN General Assembly. On November 13, 1974, from the rostrum of the UN General Assembly, he utters a historic phrase addressed to Israel:

The UN recognized the PLO as "the only legal representative Palestinian people."

In 1976, the PLO became a member of the Arab League.

Lebanon

In 1975, a civil war flared up in Lebanon, which allowed the Palestinian command to take control of the entire south of the country and fire Soviet-made rockets into the entire north of Israel.

PLO units became one of the parties in

YASIR ARAFAT

Yasser Arafat (arab. ياسر عرفات‎ ​​ ‎) (August 4, 1929, Jerusalem - November 11, 2004), real full name received at birth - Muhammad Abd ar-Rahman Abd ar-Rauf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini, also known as Abu Ammar (أبو عمّار‎ ​​ ) - chairman of the Palestinian Authority since 1993, leader of the Fatah movement (Fatah) and chairman of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) (since 1969);

He died at the age of 75 at the Percy de Clamart military hospital near Paris, France. He was married to Suha Arafat (née Suha "Susu" Tawil).

Yasser Arafat is one of the most famous radical political figures of the second half of the 20th century. His life and work received and, obviously, will always receive extremely controversial assessments, while for some Arafat is a fighter for independence and national liberation, and for others - the worst enemy, murderer and terrorist. Yasser Arafat is a politician who has practically succeeded in turning non-state violence into a legitimate form of political struggle. The Palestine Liberation Organization headed by him was admitted to the UN as an observer, and Arafat himself was welcomed in various countries as the head of state.

Biography

Yasser Arafat was born on August 24, 1929. He was the fifth child in the family of a wealthy fabric merchant from Gaza. Arafat himself said that he was from Jerusalem, like his Palestinian mother, and that he was born on August 4, but according to the documents, he was still born in Cairo. At birth, he received the name Muhammad abd ar-Rahman ar-Rauf al-Qudwa al-Husseini. The name "Yasir", which means "light", he was called later.

When Arafat was four years old, his mother died and he was taken to Jerusalem, where the family lived near the Western Wall and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, located inside the Temple Mount complex, a place that is holy to Christians, Muslims and Jews. At that time, the entire complex was under the control of the local Muslim authorities, but the increasing number of Jewish immigrants arriving in the promised land, demanded the establishment of their own control over the Temple Mount. My father married several more times, in 1937 the family returned to Cairo. Arafat was brought up by his older sister Inam - according to her, already in childhood, his favorite pastime was to command his peers.

In 1948, when the exodus of the Palestinians (nakba, catastrophe) occurred - when thousands of Palestinians were forced to leave their homeland after being defeated in the first Arab-Israeli war - Arafat himself lived in Egypt, but considered Palestine his homeland. He had long been interested in Zionist issues - he was familiar with the writings of Theodor Herzl and other Zionist theorists, as evidenced by the articles that Arafat published in the Our Palestine magazine.

Arafat later liked to say: “The international community gave the Jews a state out of guilt for the catastrophe of European Jewry. “But we, the Arab people of Palestine, also experienced a catastrophe. They received Israel as a payment for Auschwitz, but the UN also owes us for Deir Yassin (an Arab village whose entire population was destroyed by Jewish militants in 1948). Only we are not Jews, we will not wait two thousand years, but soon we will take what is ours, and by right.”

Already at the age of 17, Yasser Arafat participated in the illegal delivery of weapons to Palestine to fight the British and Jews and was engaged in revolutionary agitation. In 1948, during the war, Arafat dropped out of school, took up arms and, along with other Palestinians, tried to move to their homeland, but they were disarmed and stopped by the Egyptians, who refused to let untrained students into the war zone. Arafat, angered by the "betrayal" of the fraternal Arab states, joined the Muslim Brotherhood, and from 1952 to 1956 headed the League of Palestinian Students.

Yasser Arafat graduated from the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Cairo - then it was called King Faoud I University.

In 1956, with the rank of lieutenant in the Egyptian army, he participated in repelling the attack of the Anglo-French-Israeli forces on the Suez Canal nationalized by President Nasser.

It was in 1956 that he was first seen wearing the traditional Bedouin headscarf (keffiyeh), which until the end of his life became a symbol of Palestinian resistance.

Fatah and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)

In 1956, Arafat moved to Kuwait, where he tried to get into the construction business - but his true calling was the Palestinian revolution. He decided for himself that only the Palestinians themselves could liberate Palestine, and it was not worth counting only on the help of other Arab regimes. In the early 1950s, scattered detachments of fedayeen were already operating from the territory of Egypt, but there was no single resistance structure, organization, headquarters that would coordinate the struggle of the Palestinians for independence. Arafat took it upon himself to create such an organization.

In 1957, in Kuwait, he participated in the creation of the "Movement for the Liberation of Palestine" (Fatah) from Palestinian refugees from the Gaza Strip - and led it.

Arafat turned to the League of Arab States (LAS) for help, arguing that the strength of the Arabs is in unity, and money, weapons, people, and bases are needed for unification and armed struggle. In 1964, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was created at the expense of the League of Arab States as a political organization uniting all Palestinian resistance organizations striving for the common goal of the liberation of Palestine and the creation of an independent Palestinian state.

After the defeat of regular Arab armies in the Six-Day War (1967), the Israelis launched an offensive against Palestinian militants, and Yasser Arafat fled to Jordan (according to rumors, he crossed Jordan river dressed in women's clothing).

In 1968, in response to the explosion of a passenger bus, the Israelis carried out an operation against Fatah detachments based in the Jordanian village of al-Karama, during which 150 Palestinians and 29 Israelis were killed. Despite high Palestinian casualties, Fatah is believed to have won as the Israeli army was rebuffed and forced to retreat. In a situation of complete gloom that reigned after the crushing defeat of the Arabs in the Six-Day War, the battle in al-Karama made Arafat a national hero who dared to confront Israel. The authority of Fatah grew, with dozens of young Palestinians joining its ranks. By the end of the 1960s, Fatah, which had merged with the PLO, occupied a central place in it, and at the Palestinian National Congress in Cairo on February 3, 1969, Arafat was elected leader of the PLO, replacing Ahmad Shukairi. Two years later, Arafat became the commander-in-chief of the forces of the Palestinian revolution, and in 1973 he headed the political committee of the PLO.

It was during these years that he began to build an exemplary structure, which subsequently proved its effectiveness. Arafat creates both a "military" and a "political" wing of the organization. From now on, the Israelis formally deal with politicians, leaders of the national liberation movement, fighting for the freedom and independence of their people. Palestinians from the PLO receive financial and military support from the USSR, they are trained in military affairs by an instructor from the special services of the countries of the Warsaw Pact, here the PLO militants are provided with fake documents and the wounded soldiers are treated in closed medical institutions.

The leader of the PLO carefully builds his own image - he is emphatically not religious, always walks in a paramilitary uniform, wears keffiyeh, hates Jews. As a result, he is accepted as a welcome guest by the Arab monarchs, the Kremlin leadership, the Chinese Communists, and Western left-wing intellectuals.

Palestinian National Authority

Yitzhak Rabin, Bill Clinton and Yasser Arafat during peace talks on September 13, 1993

The years of stay in Tunisia passed under the sign of a struggle for power in the leadership of the PLO. The upper hand in this struggle was taken by Arafat, supported by all the Arab countries, as he acquired the fame of a habitual and predictable leader. The West became stronger in the same opinion, and under pressure from its main strategic ally, the United States, the Israelis were forced to negotiate.

On September 13, 1993, Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, after long, exhausting negotiations, signed the so-called Oslo Accords, under which the Palestinians recognized Israel's right to exist, and Israel assumed obligations to promote phased creation the state of Palestine, the first step towards which was the formation of the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank of the Jordan.

The signing of the agreement allowed Arafat to return to Palestine, where some considered him a hero, others considered him a traitor and collaborator. Here he headed the administration of the autonomy.

In 1994, Arafat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East (other winners were Yitzhak Rabin and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres).

Arafat is the recipient of the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize.

However, after a few years, the peace process is at an impasse.

On November 4, 1995, Israeli student Yigal Amir shot and killed Prime Minister Rabin as a traitor to the Jewish nation.

January 20, 1996 Arafat was elected president of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) - a temporary entity created in accordance with the Israeli-Palestinian agreements. In the elections, he received an overwhelming majority of votes (87%).

Next elections were scheduled for January 2002, but were later postponed, allegedly due to the impossibility of campaigning due to Israeli military raids and restrictions on freedom of movement in Israeli-occupied territories. The election of Arafat's successor as PNA president was held after his death.

Since 1996, Arafat, as the leader of the PNA, had a title denoted by the Arabic word "Rais" (Israelis and Americans translate him as "chairman", and the Palestinians themselves - as "president"). The latter version of the translation is also used in UN documents.

After becoming president of the Palestinian Authority, Arafat, according to his critics, continued to use his favorite methods. Thus, it is alleged that Fatah has created yet another paramilitary wing, the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, allegedly not controlled by the political leadership.

In mid-1996, after numerous suicide bombings that killed dozens of Israelis and retaliatory strikes by the Israeli army that killed hundreds of Palestinians, Benjamin Netanyahu of the right-wing Likud party was elected Prime Minister of Israel to replace the socialist Shimon Peres. .

Incessant terrorist attacks and retaliatory repression have led to an increase in hostility in Palestinian-Israeli relations. Netanyahu actively opposed the creation of a Palestinian statehood based on the agreements reached in 1993. US President Bill Clinton, trying to improve relations between the two leaders, organized their meeting on October 23, 1998, at which a memorandum was adopted outlining the steps of both parties to implement the agreements. This, however, did not lead to significant progress in the relations of the warring parties.

After the Israeli cabinet change, negotiations continued at the 2000 Camp David summit with Netanyahu's successor, Ehud Barak (Israeli Labor Party). Ehud Barak proposed to Arafat to create a Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip and part of the territory of the West Bank of the Jordan, and it was proposed to make East Jerusalem the capital of this state. The last sentence Baraka would mean Israeli annexation of 10% of the West Bank (mostly existing Jewish settlements) in exchange for a much smaller area in the Negev desert. According to many Palestinians, accepting such a proposal would mean turning the Palestinian state into a kind of bantustan - scattered patches of land separated by Israeli highways, checkpoints and Jewish settlements. In addition, according to the Israeli proposal, Israel would control the water resources, borders and customs of the Palestinian state, as well as another 10% of the formally Palestinian territory (mostly along the Jordanian border). It was also suggested that a limited number of Palestinian refugees be allowed to return to their home countries and that the rest be compensated.

Arafat rejected Barak's proposal and in the fall of 2000 announced the start of the second intifada, the so-called "al-Aqsa intifada". By this time, it became clear that the infrastructure of the autonomy was not being created, international financial assistance was being stolen, jobs for the Palestinians were still located exclusively in Israel, so Arafat urgently needed another “popular uprising”, to which much could be attributed. Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount served as the reason for the uprising. The Israelis responded to each new explosion with punitive operations, and after some time they began to build a many-kilometer wall, designed to separate Arab territories Palestine from Israel.

With the beginning of the second intifada, Arafat's wife moved with her daughter and mother to Paris.

Ariel Sharon became the new prime minister of Israel.

In December 2001, on his orders, Arafat's Mukata residence in Ramallah was blocked by Israeli forces. Sharon's Israeli government cut off all political relations with Arafat, and for the last three years of his life he was effectively a prisoner of Israel. In principle, he could leave the country at any time - but he would not be allowed to return.

On December 10, 2001, the European Union, Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia joined the diplomatic boycott. The reason was the publication of American materials on the smuggling of Iranian weapons to Palestine through the Suez Canal and the bribery of Egyptian customs officers.

Ariel Sharon's cabinet achieved the complete isolation of Arafat, immediately obstructing any politicians seen in contact with the Palestinian leader. The question of his deportation to some Arab country, but there were no proposals from the Arabs themselves, and the American administration opposed the forced expulsion.

Death

On October 28, 2004, the serious illness of Yasser Arafat was announced; the next day, Israel gave permission to take Arafat abroad, and on October 29, Yasser Arafat was admitted to the Percy de Clamart military hospital in Paris with suspected poisoning or cancer. Arafat's condition worsened every hour. It soon became known that he fell into a coma and his life is supported only thanks to life support equipment. A pseudo-political struggle unfolded around the dying leader between his associates and his young wife - in fact, it was a struggle for billions of dollars, which Arafat allegedly controlled.

In the early morning of November 11, Arafat was taken off life support. According to unofficial information received by journalists from hospital doctors, the main cause of Arafat's death was cirrhosis of the liver, caused by difficult living conditions and the lack of qualified medical care.

Great historical figures. 100 stories about rulers-reformers, inventors and rebels Mudrova Anna Yurievna

Arafat Yasser

Arafat Yasser

1929–2004

Fighter for the independence and national liberation of Palestine.

Yasser Arafat was the sixth child of a wealthy fabric merchant from Gaza. His real full name, given at birth, is Muhammad Abd ar-Rahman Abd ar-Rauf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini. In his youth, he changed it to the current one - Yasser Arafat (Yasir means "easy"). According to official documents, Arafat was born on August 24, 1929 in Cairo. The Palestinian leader himself has repeatedly stated that he was born in Jerusalem. Arafat, naming Jerusalem as his birthplace, seems to want to become closer to this city, which he and his compatriots dream of making the capital of an independent Palestinian state. According to other sources, a boy born in Jerusalem was registered by his father and mother in Cairo, which opened up the opportunity to study and work in Egypt.

His father, Abdel Rauf Arafat, a landowner from Gaza, and his mother, Zahwa Abu Saud, who belonged to a noble Jerusalem clan, whose roots date back to the family of the Prophet Muhammad, moved to Egypt in 1927. When Arafat was four years old, another brother, Fathi, was born, and his mother died suddenly. The father, who suffered the loss, sent two kids to Jerusalem to their uncle (brother of his wife) Salim Abu Saud. The family lived near the Wailing Wall and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, located inside the Temple Mount complex - the place where the Jewish Temple was located in biblical times. At that time, the entire complex was under the control of local Muslim authorities, but numerous Jewish residents of Jerusalem demanded the establishment of their own control over the Temple Mount.

The family in which the future Palestinian leader was brought up was closely connected with nationalist circles. Prominent figures of the Muslim community often visited the house of Salim Abu Saud and held political conversations. Arafat often recalls the night when British soldiers broke into the house and began to beat everyone. The father married several more times, and in 1937 the family returned to Cairo.

During the Second World War, the capital of Egypt resembled a seething cauldron, in which political passions boiled, different worldviews and views clashed. In those years, the main trends that influenced life position Arafat, were Arab patriotism and nationalism.

These two factors were superimposed on the confidence of the future Palestinian leader that the most important guarantee of success in politics, and indeed in any other field, is a good education. Arafat applied to the University of Texas for an engineering degree, but the US denied him a visa because he was already seen as a participant in the struggle between the Palestinians and the established state of Israel. So he entered Cairo University.

On November 29, 1947, the UN adopted a plan to divide Palestine into Arab and Jewish state. According to the resolution, Jerusalem with the area adjacent to it was not to belong to any of these states, but to be under international administration. Arab leaders, including the Arab League and the Palestinian Arab High Council, categorically rejected the UN plan to partition Palestine and said they would make every effort to prevent its implementation. Slow clashes between Jewish and Arab paramilitary groups began to escalate into a full-scale war. It was the Arab-Israeli war of 1947-1949, when there was an exodus of Palestinian Arabs, and thousands of Arabs left their homes.

Most likely, the world would hardly remember the Palestinian people if there were not such a bright personality in the Middle East politics as Yasser Arafat.

Arafat lived in Egypt, but considered Palestine his homeland. He very painfully accepted the defeat of the Arabs in this war with Israel. In student disputes, he called the refusal of the Arab countries to partition Palestine in accordance with the resolution of the UN General Assembly a mistake. Apparently, it was then that he had the idea that the Palestinians should take care of their own fate, and not wait for the “Arab brothers” to do it for them. “The international community gave the Jews a state out of guilt for the catastrophe of European Jewry ... But we, the Arab people of Palestine, also survived the catastrophe. They received Israel as payment for Auschwitz, but the UN owes us for Deir Yassin. Only we are not Jews, we will not wait two thousand years, but soon we will take what is ours, and by right.” [Deir Yassin - locality near Jerusalem, where tragic events took place that led to the death of many Arabs.]

Already at the age of 17, Yasser Arafat participated in the illegal delivery of weapons to Palestine to fight the British and Jews and was engaged in revolutionary agitation. Energetic, strong-willed and hardy, he not only participated in political discussions, but also actively mastered military affairs. In 1948, during the war, Arafat dropped out of school, took up arms and, along with other Palestinians, tried to move to their homeland, but they were disarmed and stopped by the Egyptians, who refused to let untrained students into the war zone. Arafat, angered by the "betrayal" of the fraternal Arab states, joined the Muslim Brotherhood, and from 1952 to 1956 headed the League of Palestinian Students. He received an officer's diploma - this was helped by the decision of his parents to register his birth in Egypt. And in 1956, when the Anglo-French-Israeli forces rushed to the Suez Canal, which had been nationalized by Nasser, Lieutenant Arafat was already in command of a demolition unit in the Palestinian formations.

Yasser Arafat graduated from the Faculty of Engineering at Cairo University. In 1956 he moved to Kuwait, where by that time there was a thriving Palestinian community. There he entered the construction business, in which he excelled. But his true calling was the Palestinian revolution.

In 1957, in Kuwait, he participated in the creation, and then led the "Movement for the Liberation of Palestine" (Fatah). The majority in the movement at that time were Palestinian refugees who initially settled in the Gaza Strip, studied at Cairo and Beirut universities and worked in various Arab countries. Carried out by Fatah fighters on January 1, 1965, the first guerrilla operation in Israel went down in history as the beginning of the Palestinian resistance movement.

Many then-Palestinian leaders called on the Arabs to unite in order to "throw the Jews into the sea" and create an independent Palestinian state in the vacated space. Arafat and his associates put forward a fundamentally new program. Her main principle“The liberation of Palestine is first and foremost a matter for the Palestinians themselves.” To achieve this, according to the leaders of Fatah, is possible only by "armed guerrilla struggle against Israel."

In 1964, by decision of the League of Arab States with the aim of "liberating Palestine" and granting "legitimate rights Arab population Palestine, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was founded. Ahmed Shukeyri was appointed the first chairman of the PLO executive committee, after which Yahye Hammuda held the post for a little more than a year. The third chairman of the PLO executive committee was Yasser Arafat from 1969 until his death in 2004. Since then, Fatah representatives have been the majority in the PLO executive committee and determine its policy.

The defeat of the Arabs in the "six-day war" in June 1967 once again convinced Arafat and his supporters that one should rely on own forces and to fight for the liberation of Palestine. From that moment on, the Fatahites stepped up military operations in the occupied territories and turned from a small organization into a leading military-political force.

For a decade and a half, Yasser Arafat issued orders that resulted in thousands of deaths. In just 30 years between 1964 and 1994, 866 Israelis were killed by Palestinian terrorists, including those not affiliated with the PLO. PLO militants and groups not controlled by it seized regular buses and schools in Israel, detonated bombs in squares and institutions, hunted Israelis and their sympathizers around the world, hijacked planes, took hostages.

In 1974 there was a turning point in PLO policy. Although the PLO continued to strike at the civilian population of Israel, Arafat began to deny his involvement in the attacks. He blamed the attacks on the “military wing” of the PLO, which consists of young hot people, avengers who lost friends and relatives in the war with the “Zionist enemies”, that is, extreme extremists who are not always able to be controlled. Arafat suggested negotiating with the PLO wing, most of which created the impression of civilized, European-educated people, sober politicians who were willing to sit down at the negotiating table.

In 1974, a new political program of the PLO was adopted, which called for the struggle for the creation of a Palestinian state "not instead of, but along with Israel", that is, in the territory of the West Bank of the Jordan River and in the Gaza Strip. After that, the PLO was recognized by more than a hundred states, and its leader became a central figure on the Middle East political scene. The UN recognized the PLO as "the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people". In 1976, the PLO became a member of the Arab League.

In the early 1990s, as yet secret contacts began between the Palestinian and Israeli leadership. Things were moving towards a peace conference, but in August 1990, Yasser Arafat made one of his most serious mistakes by publicly supporting the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. It's on long years deprived the PLO of financial support for the Arab monarchies of the Persian Gulf.

On September 13, 1993, Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, after lengthy secret negotiations, signed the "Oslo Accords", according to which the PLO pledged to recognize Israel's right to peace and security and to stop terrorist activities. As a result of the agreements, the Palestinian National Authority - PNA - was created, which gained control over part of West Bank the Jordan River and the Gaza Strip. It was planned to achieve a final settlement of the conflict within 5 years.

The signing of the agreements allowed Arafat to return to his territories and lead the PNA. It was almost a dream come true for Arafat - a step towards the creation of Palestine. Arafat settled in Ramallah.

In 1994, Arafat, along with Rabin and Israeli Foreign Minister Peres, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East.

However, after a few years, the peace process is at an impasse. New complications began, military and terrorist actions, loss of life on both sides. All this led to a diplomatic boycott of the Palestinians by Israel, the European Union, Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. The reason was the publication of American materials on the smuggling of Iranian weapons for the PNA through the Suez Canal and the bribery of Egyptian customs officials.

The Israeli government cut off all political relations with Arafat, and for the last three years of his life he was virtually a prisoner of Israel. In principle, he could leave the country at any time, but, most likely, he would not be allowed to return.

Israel succeeded in isolating Arafat completely by immediately obstructing any politicians seen in contact with the Palestinian leader. The question of his deportation to some Arab country was periodically discussed, but no proposals were received from the Arabs themselves, and the American administration opposed the forced deportation.

On October 28, 2004, the serious illness of Yasser Arafat was announced; the next day, Israel gave permission to take Arafat abroad, and on October 29, Yasser Arafat was placed in a Paris military hospital. Soon it became known that he fell into a coma. In the early morning of November 11, 2008, Arafat was taken off life support. Around information about the cause of death there are many rumors: from cirrhosis of the liver to poisoning.

On the same day, the body of the Palestinian leader was transported to the Cairo airport, then the coffin was delivered by Egyptian helicopters to Ramallah In Ramallah, where Arafat spent last years life, in 2007 the mausoleum of Arafat was erected.