Arafat 'poisoned by visitors'

YASSER Arafat's cabinet secretary believes the late Palestinian leader may have been poisoned more than a year ago when he received a delegation of supposed supporters in his Ramallah compound.  "Something strange happened to Arafat around a year ago. It was on September 25, 2003...," Ahmed Abdelrahman told the London-based Al-Hayat daily newspaper. "The president shook hands with around 30 people before leaving to vomit. It was from that moment that the president's health started slowly deteriorating," he said. Since Arafat died in a French hospital of a mystery illness on November 11, several leading Palestinian officials have suggested the veteran leader had been poisoned, although French doctors have insisted there was no medical basis for such allegations. Two weeks before the visit mentioned by Abdelrahman, the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's cabinet had taken a decision to "remove" Arafat from his Ramallah compound, although without specifying by what means. [more]