Suha Arafat, the wife [his second wife after his infrequently publicized divorce to his first] of late Palestinian resistance leader Yasser Arafat, has come to the defense of Palestinian Authority “President” Mahmoud Abass [his term expired in January and he remains in power only at the behest of the occupying Israelis for whom he is a willing puppet].
Senior Fatah official Faruq Qaddami recently stated on al-Jazeera that Abass and his right-hand man and even more subservient Israeli puppet Mohammad Dahlan conspired with Israel in 2003 to kill Arafat. Abass was, naturally, furious at the public assertion that he was working with the enemy to take down the most revered Palestinian resistance leader. But instead of confronting Qaddami, the coward Abass went after al-Jazeera and closed their office in Ramallah, the PA’s capital in the occupied West Bank.
al-Jazeera fired back by giving the damaging interview [which I believe is not credible] a lot of coverage. Abass has since been humbled – al-Jazeera is a powerful enemy since its stock with Arab masses is beyond that of any Arab regime or institution – and the offices of al-Jazeera have been reopened.
Abass has made the decision not to personally confront the charges except to dismiss them by way of press release. It is understandable. Standing in front of reporters defending against such a conspiracy would only lend credibility to it and invite more questions.
Instead, Abass has hired his fellow corrupt flock to do his work for him. And so coming in at 400-pounds and fake highlights Suha Arafat:
I despise this woman as both a passionate supporter of the Palestinian people and their cause and as a Tunisian for her stench walked my birth country for years.
Suha comes from a prominent Christian family and met Arafat while both were in Tunis, and she was a press aid to the PLO. They married and had a daughter; both after Arafat returned to his native soil they barely saw one another. The occupation and constant threat of death from the occupying Israel wasn’t exactly the Ritz, and Suha preferred Tunis and Paris.
But that does not mean she did not help herself to a lot of ill-gotten money intended for her people. Over the years, her marriage to the corrupt, self-serving, unprincipled, vindictive, and buffoonish Arafat allowed her to steal millions in foreign aid allocated for the destitute Palestinians.
She invested her money building several hotels in Tunis. Upon Arafat’s death, she demanded a living allowance from the PA. Of course, she is not entitled to anything since she already had millions in stolen funds in the bank and her Tunisian properties and interest on savings earned her more than enough accumulation…if one is concerned with that. Nonetheless, the corrupt PA offered Suha and her only daughter $20 million one-time-payment and annual payments of $500,000 a month. She refused. Yes, she is that cruel and selfish.
Instead, she argued she had an entitlement to half the PA’s assets – which are in the billions – and sued unsuccessfully for them. Fortunately, her bad fortune continued as she had her Tunisian citizenship revoked and forced to leave the country after she tired to marry the brother-in-law of Tunisian President Ben Ali; BelHassan Trabelsi.
BelHassan Trabelsi is the second most vulgar and corrupt member of the in-law Travelsi family – the first is his sister and Tunisian First Lady [and aspiring Tunisian president] Leila Trabelsi. The Trabelsis are an uneducated family – BelHassan did not even finish high school – who have acquired great wealth solely through their daughters marriage to the president [he was then prime minister and Leila was his mistress. Always wanting a son; his first wife bore a daughter; Leila told him she was pregnant with a boy. After they married and he rose to the presidency, she gave birth to a girl.] They run a state-assisted mafia and the greed knows no bounds.
Naturally, Suha grew close to them and her and Leila are known to be great friends. BelHassan offer the promise of another rich husband of leech of for the insatiable Suha. One problem: BelHassan had a wife and Tunisia prohibits polygamy [the only Arab and one of the few Muslims countries to do so]. The Tunisian government kicked out Suha upon news of the illegal marriage, but her property remains under his control and none other than Lebanese Forces Pierre Rizq – of the same Lebanese Forces that hate Palestinians and massacred them in Sabre and Chatelia [and elsewhere] and the same Pierre Rizq who was the Lebanese Forces’ representative to Israel during the Lebanese Civil War when the LF was receiving arms and financial aid from the Israelis. This is how corrupt and indifferent this awful woman is toward the plight of her people.
But let us not go overboard and say that she does not care about anything but money. She does care about Arafat’s projection. She has protested on Arab media on two documentaries on Arafat. One because it mentioned Arafat’s first wife and a second time because she felt she was entitled to royalty from a documentary on her late lousy husband. O’ wait, the second it about money. And does this woman think that the discussions of Arafat and images taken by media organizations require a copyright fee to be paid to her? She is that greedy that she believes any films on a public figure requires her to be paid.
Since getting the boot from Tunisia, Suha has resided in Malta where Col. Qddafi built her a house. How I envy her since he all know Qaddafi’s great taste in architecture a la his tents!:
Today, she was on Arab television where he refuted Qaddami and stated that Abass is entirely innocently. That is probably true, but Suha must not believe that there is anything akin to a video record. In the days following Arafat’s death, Suha stated more than once on Arab television that Arafat was poisoned and hinted that not only was Israel a suspect but rivals within Fatah. Who was a bigger rival of Arafat and the number two to replace Arafat than Abbas? And now Suha thinks the Arabs have forgotten her early words and is rushing to defend her pal Abass.
I am sure Abass worked out some monetary deal with his equally greedy, corrupt new found friend.
A nice lady, no?
