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    Arafat dead, say Palestinian sources amid confusion
    (Agencies)
    Updated: 2004-11-09 22:04

    The fate of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat was mired in confusion on Tuesday as French doctors contradicted reports by senior Palestinian officials that the veteran leader had died at a Paris hospital.

    Palestinian policemen carry a poster of President Yasser Arafat during a rally to support him in the West Bank city of Hebron November 9, 2004. Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie saw Yasser Arafat in a French hospital on Tuesday after doctors said the Palestinian leader had slipped into a deeper coma, a Palestinian source at the hospital said.  [Reuters]
    Several political sources said Arafat, 75, in a coma for the past six days, had succumbed to the mystery illness that led to his being flown to Paris from the West Bank on Oct. 29, thrusting his Palestinian Authority into crisis.

    "He is dead. It is possible they will delay the announcement," one Palestinian source said. "He died after bleeding in the brain began last night. His bodyguards started hugging and kissing and telling each other to be strong."

    But a spokesman for French medical services insisted Arafat was still alive, saying: "Mr. Arafat is not dead."

    Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath told CNN from Paris that Arafat was alive and no decision has been made to take him off life-support.

    The flurry of conflicting reports surfaced during a visit to Paris by a delegation of three senior Palestinian officials, all seen as potential successors to Arafat, to check on the Palestinian leader despite his wife's angry objections.

    Two Palestinians men react after hearing the news of President Yasser Arafat in the centre of the West Bank city of Ramallah on November 9, 2004. [Reuters]
    In four decades leading the Palestinian nationalist cause, Arafat has gone from guerrilla icon to Nobel prize-winning peacemaker to a shunned old leader facing renewed bloodshed with Israel.

    Arafat has been in a coma brought on by a still-undisclosed illness, with his dream of a Palestinian state unrealized, a possible succession battle brewing and the threat of chaos in Palestinian territories looming.

    He has been widely admired by Palestinians as the father of their struggle for statehood but was reviled by many Israelis as the face of terror.

    Both sides have wondered whether his death might serve as the catalyst for first real peace effort in years or plunge the region into deeper crisis.

    SWIFT DECLINE

    Arafat had been flown to the Paris military hospital from his battered West Bank headquarters where he had been effectively confined by Israel for more than two and a half years.

    Despite his reputation as a consummate survivor, Arafat's decline came swiftly and with little warning.

    Tayyeb Abdel-Rahi, a senior aide to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat reacts during a press conference at the Arafat's compound in the West Bank city of Ramallah on November 9, 2004. [Reuters]
    Initial claims that he was suffering from a stomach ailment soon gave way to widespread reports that he had slipped into a coma and that his organs were failing.

    French doctors kept a tight lid on details of Arafat's condition at the behest of his wife, Suha, who engaged in a war of words with senior Palestinians officials over her virtual monopoly on information from his hospital bedside.

    But on Tuesday, as the officials arrived in Paris to check on Arafat, doctors said he had slipped deeper into a coma.

    The delegation including Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie, Shaath and Palestine Liberation Organization Secretary General Mahmoud Abbas arrived at the hospital after France hinted it was losing patience with the visit dispute.

     

    The hospital had ruled out leukemia but had not given any diagnosis of Arafat's illness. Palestinian officials said he had suffered from liver failure.

    All three leaders who flew into Paris on Monday are potential successors and Arafat's wife had accused them of wanting to "bury him alive." Shaath said the delegation wanted to get the full facts on Arafat.

    Despite the bickering, Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Monday he was impressed by the Palestinian leaders' handling of Arafat's absence and said he hoped the "relative calm" in the region would continue.

    "I hope that sense of quiet and calm can be maintained and (that) it gives us something to work with," Powell told reporters on the way to Mexico. He reiterated that the United States was "ready to engage as soon as it is appropriate to engage" with the so-called road map peace plan.



     
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