Suha Arafat: I wish I’d never married himPalestinian leader’s widow denies she has millions in the bank, claims to have turned down dozens of suitors

Nine years after the death of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, his widow said she regrets the marriage and given the choice again, would not have wed him.

“The marriage to Arafat was a big mistake and I regret it,” said Suha Arafat in an interview published last week in the Turkish-language Sabah newspaper. “We were married for 22 years and it felt like 50.”

Arafat added that she had repeatedly tried to leave her husband but was denied her freedom.

“I tried to divorce Arafat more than 100 times and he didn’t let me,” she said. “Everyone knows about this story, especially those who were in his inner circle.”

According to the report, the two first met in 1986 when she was a student in Paris and engaged to a local lawyer. At the time, Suha recalled, the Palestinian leader, 33 years her senior, was a much sought after man.

“There were many women who wanted to marry him but he only wanted me, despite the objections of my family,” she said.

Suha said that although her relatives, a well-established Ramallah family, were opposed to the union, the pair married in secret on her birthday four years later. Her mother was furious at the development and flew to Tunis where she angrily berated Arafat for entering into a marriage with her daughter, which she deemed inappropriate.

“Fate chose me and it wasn’t easy right from the start,” she said.

As soon as she became Mrs. Arafat she was locked away behind walls for security reasons, Suha said.

“I had to be careful in my phone conversations because of bugging, and we were always moving from one location to another.”

Suha recalled that after her husband initiated the first intifada in 1987 — it actually began as a spontaneous uprising — the world’s media attention was focused on him, “and it is no secret that it [the media] is controlled by Jews” she noted.

As the wife of man who spent so much time in the international media spotlight, Suha said she felt like the weakest link in the chain.

“My identity was completely destroyed,” she said.

Suha Arafat. (photo credit: Sharon Perry/Flash90)

Since Arafat’s death in a Paris hospital in 2004 — she has claimed that he was poisoned — Suha said she has had dozens of marriage proposals, but rejected all hopeful suitors with the same answer: “Arafat was my hero.”

Suha lives on a stipend she gets from the Palestinian Authority, which she said is barely sufficient to support her and her daughter, and is a far distance fromreports on millions of dollars that went to her through secret bank accounts.

“All the stories about Arafat putting millions in my bank account are nonsense and lies,” she said. The money is with those who were close to Arafat and anyone who is determined can find it.”

She also denied a rumor that the apartment she now shares with her teenager daughter Zawa in Malta was purchased as a gift by the former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. The apartment, she said, is rented.

“Even if I have regrets I accept the reality. Arafat was a great leader and I was very lonely in my marriage. I was always on the defensive because of the rumors that they spread about me. But life without him is even harder.”

“If I could turn back time I wouldn’t marry Arafat,” she added.

Arafat was a strong supporter of the decision to exhume her husband in November 2012 amid claims he was poisoned.

Marie Antoinette compares her husband to Mandela

CNN interviews Suha Arafat, who compares her husband to Nelson Mandela.

Suha was interviewed for a CNN documentary series The Price of Kings. CNN claims it is the first time that Suha has agreed to be interviewed on camera. She was interviewed by CNN's Becky Anderson.

Following allegations within the Arab world that Israel poisoned Yasser Arafat, who died of a mysterious illness in 2004, Anderson asked Suha whether she would have wanted a full autopsy on his body.

"Yes, but it was the decision of the Palestinian Authority, and I respected their decision. Yasser died with his secrets with him and no one can know the truth now."

Well, some people, aside from Suha, known the truth. Like his personal physician, Dr. Ashraf al-Qurdi.

Let's go to the videotape.


Arafat's personal doctor : "Arafat died of AIDS" by Ibn-Khaldun

Back to Suha.

When asked why after years of silence did she decide to speak out now she said: "Because of the injustices that was exerted against my husband and myself all this time.

"This has made me speak about what happened especially the last days of Yasser, the last you know, after the intifada Yasser and myself were portrayed as devils. I was portrayed as very, very - as the Mary Antoinette of the Arab world."

Well, gee, I wonder why. Maybe that's what happens when you're the widow of the leader of an 'impoverished people,' and they have to pay you half a million dollars per year to live in Paris in addition to possibly having access to the Swiss bank accounts he stole from them.

"Did he have a conscience?" asked Anderson; "Of course he had a conscience. Yasser Arafat was the conscience – he was the Mandela of the Arab world, the Mandela of Palestine," Suha stated.

Mandela was smart enough to take a deal when he was offered one. Arafat set loose terrorists to commit random murders instead.

More on the filth of Yasser Arafat here.

May his name be obliterated. 

Suha: Lea Rabin Invited Me to Israel More Than Once

Breaking a lengthy silence, Suha Arafat, wife of former PLO terror leader Yasser Arafat, denied charges that she had embezzled millions of dollars from the Palestinian Authority. “I did not take money from Palestine,” Suha told an Egyptian journalist.

Several weeks ago Tunisia issued an international arrest warrant for Suha, who is wanted for questioning for allegedly absconding with Tunisian government and PA funds that had been meant to be used to build a school. She had been been a Tunisian citizen during the period when the corruption reportedly took place. In 2007, her Tunisian citizenship was removed by the same administration that was toppled from power earlier this year, partly due to similar charges of corruption.

In the interview, Suha said that some of the money in question had been used to build a playground for her and Yasser's daughter, Zahwa. “After 50 years of working for Palestine, does Arafat not deserve to have a playground for his daughter? He didn't buy jewelry or build factories for her. All he did was build a little playground in Tunisia. This is the only time he used money for Zahwa, and I can prove it,” she said.

The interview, broadcast on an Arab satellite channel, was the first time Zahwa Arafat appeared in public. Suha said she was planning to become a lawyer. “She has no interest in politics, after seeing what has happened to me.” Suha blamed most of her problems on unfounded accusations made by Leila Ben-Ali, the wife of the former Tunisian president. “I was her first victim, and she took revenge on me,” Suha said, discussing the falling out she had with Ben-Ali and how her new enemy spread rumors about her corruption, culminating with her being stripped of her Tunisian citizenship.

Suha is a French citizen, and Zahwa was born in Paris. When asked why her daughter was not born in Ramallah, where Yasser Arafat controlled the PA, Suha said she had decided against that, because she did not want her daughter to have anything to do with Israel. “I told the Israelis, you are the ones who destroyed Gaza, you destroyed our hospitals,” she said. PA Arabs, while not Israeli citizens, need an Israeli permit to travel abroad.

Suha added that she had been against the Oslo Accords and developing relations with Israel, and that she had turned down numerous invitations by Lea Rabin, deceased wife of former Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin, to visit Israel. “I said how can I visit Tel Aviv when our prisoners are still in prison,” she said.

Yasser Arafat: Why Many Palestinians Don't Miss Him

Six years have passed since the death of Yasser Arafat and it does not seem that many Palestinians really miss the man.

The number of Palestinians who show up at public rallies to commemorate Arafat has actually been declining year after year.

Arafat, as far as disillusioned Palestinian are concerned, should be remembered as a leader who led his people from one disaster to another.

He died in November 2004, leaving behind scorched earth and tremendous suffering and pain.

Even some of his former confidants admit that he was a ruthless man who did not hesitate to kill anyone who dared to challenge him or draw a cartoon making fun of him.

In Jordan, Arafat brought disaster on his people when he tried to create a state-within-a-state, forcing the Jordanians to massacre thousands of Palestinians in what is known as Black September.

Arafat and his supporters then went to Lebanon, where this time he did succeed in creating a state-within-a-state and played a major role in the Lebanese civil war, which resulted in the death of tens of thousands of Lebanese and Palestinians.

Most Arab countries refused to receive Arafat and the PLO after they were forced by Israel to leave Lebanon in 1982. Tunis was the only country that agreed to temporarily host the PLO leadership.

Another disaster that befell the Palestinians during Arafat's era was the mass expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from the Gulf countries in the early 1990s -- an expulsion for which Arafat was directly and personally responsible. His public support for Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait had turned most of the Arab countries against the "ungrateful" Palestinians.

After the signing of the Oslo Accords, Arafat established in the West Bank and Gaza Strip a corrupt regime that repressed Palestinians and deprived them of international aid.

Arafat also brought with him to the West Bank and Gaza Strip anarchy and lawlessness. Under his authority, dozens of armed militias and gangs emerged, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which flourished under him.

Arafat's bad governance and financial corruption radicalized Palestinians and drove them into the open arms of Hamas. His incitement against Israel also drove Palestinians toward radicalism.

The second intifada, which erupted in September 2000 with Arafat's blessing -- and in which thousands of Israelis and Palestinians were killed and wounded -- is now being described by many Palestinians as a "strategic mistake."

Since the death of Arafat, Palestinians have been working hard to pick up the pieces and start a new and better life. With the help of the international community, the Palestinians, in the West Bank at least, are once again busy building government institutions and strengthening their economy.

In light of all this, it is sad to see that the Palestinian leadership has invested millions of dollars in building a mausoleum for Arafat in Ramallah. The money could have been used to establish a center that promotes tolerance and coexistence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.