WEST BANK: SECOND GROUP OF FOREIGN DOCTORS CONFIRM THAT PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT YASSER ARAFAT HE HAD RECENTLY BEEN TAKEN ILL WITH FLU

Record ID: 566250

  • Title: WEST BANK: SECOND GROUP OF FOREIGN DOCTORS CONFIRM THAT PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT YASSER ARAFAT HE HAD RECENTLY BEEN TAKEN ILL WITH FLU
  • Date: 24th October 2004
  • Summary: (W7) RAMALLAH, WEST BANK (OCTOBER 24, 2004) (REUTERS) 1. VARIOUS OF PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT YASSER ARAFAT MEETING WITH EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE 0.07 2. PUL OUT: ARAFAT SMILING 0.19 3. VARIOUS OF EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEMBERS AT MEETING WITH ARAFAT (2 SHOTS) 0.37 4. SLV/WS: EXTERIOR OF ARAFAT'S COMPOUND AT NIGHT (2 SHOTS) 0.49 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 8th November 2004 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: RAMALLAH, WEST BANK
  • City:
  • Country: Palestinian Territories
  • Reuters ID: LVA3SYGRA76LTUTBODQFKWPG5LDD
  • Story Text: Foreign doctors find Arafat has flu.


    Palestinian President Yasser Arafat held a meeting
    with Palestinian officials in his office on Sunday (October
    24) hours after a second group of foreign doctors said that
    Arafat, taken ill last week, was suffering from the flu.

    Arafat looked well at a meeting with the Palestinian
    Executive Committee in his battered Ramallah headquarters
    where he has been confined by Israel for almost three years.

    Ahmed Tibi, a member of Israel's parliament and a
    former adviser to Arafat, 75, said Tunisian doctors who
    examined him on Saturday (October 23) made the same
    diagnosis as Egyptian physicians who saw him earlier in the
    week.

    Israel's Channel Two television said on Saturday that
    both teams of doctors concluded that Arafat was suffering
    from gall stones and had an intestinal infection.

    The television station said Arafat would likely need to
    travel abroad for surgery.

    Saeb Erekat, a Palestinian cabinet minister, denied the
    Israeli reports that Arafat needed an operation.

    Israel has said Arafat is free to leave Ramallah but it
    could not guarantee it would allow him to return. Israel
    has accused Arafat of fomenting violence in a Palestinian
    uprising that began in 2000, an allegation he denies.

    Arafat has long been rumoured to suffer from
    Parkinson's disease. Aides say he suffers from neurological
    injuries caused by a near-fatal plane crash in Libya in
    1992.

    Palestinian sources said Arafat had suffered from a
    high fever and nausea, forcing him to cancel several
    meetings and miss prayers at the start of the Muslim holy
    month of Ramadan a week ago. They said he had since
    recovered but needed to rest.

    Arafat has refused to heed doctors' orders not to fast
    during Ramadan, when Muslims abstain from food and drink
    during daylight hours, Tibi said.

    Arafat is also attended by Palestinian doctors who
    visit him at his headquarters.


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