Mahmoud Abbas Helped Kill Arafat

Farouk al-Kaddoumi, a senior Palestine Liberation Organization leader, claims that Palestinian Authority chief Mahmoud Abbas was directly involved in the murder of former PA chairman and terrorist leader Yasser Arafat. Fatah leaders in the PA said the charges were politically motivated lies.

Kaddoumi, the head of the PLO's political office and the formal chairman of Fatah, told a press conference on Monday that he had protocols from a 2004 meeting between Israeli, American and PA representatives that clearly indicate a plan to poison Arafat. According to Kaddoumi, it was not only Abbas who was involved from the PA side, but former Gaza strongman Muhammad Dahlan as well. Before the Hamas takeover of Gaza, Dahlan served as the head of the PA's secret police and preventative security forces in the Gaza region.

Arafat died in November 2004 after a brief but intense illness, during which he was transported to France for emergency treatment. The cause of his death was never made public, but speculation ranged from assassination to liver failure to AIDS. More