Yasser

Arafat Biography
Yasser Arafat was the first President of the Palestinian National
Authority and the founder of the Al Fatah group.
Quick Facts
Famous as

1st President of the Palestinian National

Authority

Nationality

Palestinian

Religion

Sunni Islam

Political ideology

Fatah

Born on

24 August 1929

Zodiac Sign

Virgo

Born in

Cairo

Died on

11 November 2004

Place of death

Clamart

Father

Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini

Mother

Zahwa Abul Saud

Siblings

Fathi

Spouse:

Suha Arafat (m. 19902004)

Children

Zahwa Arafat

Education

University of King Fuad I,

Works &
Achievements

PLO Leader and Nobel Peace Prize

winner

Quick Facts
1994 - Nobel Peace Prize
Awards

- Time's Person of the Year

- Jawaharlal Nehru Award

Im age Source :
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/france-opensmurder-inquiry-into-yasser-arafats-death-8084734.html
Yasser Arafat was a leader of the state of Palestine and 1st
President of the Palestinian National Authority. The leader is
also known as the Chairman of the Palestine liberation
Organization who founded the secular political party Fatah in
1959, stepping in as its leader. Mainly known for his anti-Israeli
stance, Arafat pushed the country in to a long war with Israel in
the name of self-determination. While he is portrayed as a
martyr in his own country Palestine, Arafat is also condemned
for his attacks on Israeli civilians. The tension between these
countries finally began subsiding with the acceptation of UN
Security Council resolution 242 in 1988, and he eventually
succeeded in managing the uneasy balance between militancy
and diplomacy in the Middle East. Arafat made the mistake of
supporting Saddam Hussein during the Kuwait crisis of 1990
and paid the price of political isolation in the Gulf. In 1994,
Yasser Arafat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with
Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin.
Childhood

Yasser Arafat was born on August 24, 1929 in Cairo, the capital
city of Egypt. His father Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini, a
Gazan, was a spice, incense and grocery merchant. His original
name was Mohammed Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini.
Arafat was the fifth among the seven children born to Husseini
His mother, Zahwa Abul Saud, was from Jerusalem and a
religiously devoted woman. She died from a kidney ailment in
1933. Following the death of his mother, Arafat and his bother
Faithi supposedly spent the next four years with his uncle in
Jerusalem. Arafat had a deteriorating relationship with his father
and when he died in 1952, Arafat did not even attend the
funeral.

Re v olutionary Activ itie s
Arafat entered the Cairo University (then, University of King
Faud I) in 1947 and studied of Judaism and Zionism. It was
during his college years that Arafat adopted the name Yasser,
which means easygoing in Arabic. At the same time, Arafat
became an Arab nationalist involved in the Palestinian cause.
He began to procure weapons into the territory. During the 1948
ArabIsraeli War, Arafat left the University and, along with other
Arabs, sought to enter Palestine to join Arab forces fighting
against Israeli troops. Before the Arabs were defeated by Israel
in 1948, Arafat was a leader in the Palestinian effort to smuggle
arms into the territory. In 1949, when the situation was in favor
of the Israel's troops Arafat returned to Cairo.

After returning to University, Arafat studied civil engineering and
graduated with a bachelor s degree. In 1956, Arafat was called
to duty to fight with Egyptian forces during the Suez Crisis. He
served as a second lieutenant in the Egyptian Army during the
crisis. After the Suez War, Arafat settled in Kuwait. He first
employed in the department of public works and eventually set
up his own contracting firm. T here he developed friendships
with two Palestinian nationals Abu Iyad and Abu Jihad. T hey
were both official members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.

Foundation of Al-Fatah
In 1958 Arafat, along with his friends founded Al-Fatah , an
underground network of secret cells, which later advocated
armed struggle against Israel. Fatah dedicated itself to the
liberation of Palestine by an armed struggle and at the end of
1964 Arafat left Kuwait to become full-time revolutionary,
organizing raids into Israel from Jordan.

In order to act independently, Arafat refused to accept donations
from the major Arab heads. However, he did not want to alienate
them, and sought their support by avoiding alliances with groups
loyal to some other ideologies. To establish the groundwork for
Fatah's financial support, Arafat sought contributions from the
wealthy Palestinians working in the Gulf States. Interestingly,
the businessmen and oil workers of the Gulf region contributed
generously to the Fatah organization.

In 1962, Fatah had approximately three hundred members, but
none were fighters. Fatah's manpower increased further after
Arafat decided to offer much higher salaries to members of the
Palestine Liberation Army (PLA), the regular military force of the
Arab League in 1964.

Fatah emerged as the most powerful and best organized of the
groups and Arafat became the chairman of the PLO executive
committee. T he PLO was no longer a puppet organization of the
Arab states, but an independent nationalist organization, based
in Jordan
Disturbed by the activities of Arafat and his men, Jordan King,
Hussein, expelled the PLO from his country. Arafat then sought
to build a similar organization in Lebanon. Because of
Lebanon's weak central government, the PLO was able to
operate virtually as an independent state.

Munich Massacre

During the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Black

September , a Palestinian militant group, kidnapped and killed
eleven Israeli athletes. T he incident came to be known as
Munich Massacre . T he Black September, as reported by some
noted historians, was a branch of Fatah used for paramilitary
operations. In 197374, Arafat directed the PLO to withdraw
from acts of violence outside Israel, the West Bank and Gaza
Strip.
To investigate the Munich Massacre, the Israeli government
launched the Operation Bayonet. It ordered its intelligence
agecy, Mossad to hunt down those known to have been
involved. In 1979, the Mossad had assassinated at least eight
PLO members including Ali Hassan Salameh, a commander of
Yasser Arafat's personal security squad.

A 1973 United States Department of State document,
declassified in 2006, concluded that the Khartoum operation
was planned and executed with the full knowledge and personal
approval

of

Yasser

Arafat.

T he

Khartoum

diplomatic

assassinations were the killing of three Western diplomats held

hostage between 1 March 1973 and 3 March 1973 in the Saudi
embassy in Khartoum, capital city of Sudan. T hey were
murdered by the Palestinian terrorist group Black September.
Arafat denied any involvement in the operation and insisted it
was carried out independently by the Black September group.

In 1973, the PLO was inducted into the Arab League at Rabat
summit and also declared the sole legitimate representative of
the Palestinian people. Arafat became the first representative of
a non-governmental organization to address a plenary session
of the UN General Assembly. During the Lebanon war, Arafat
aligned the PLO with the Nasserist Lebanese National
Movement led by Kamal Jumblatt. Syrian President Hafez alAssad, fearing a loss of control in Lebanon, sent members of the
Tigers Militia against PLO.

In February 1975, the militia gunned down prominent proPalestinian leader, Ma'arouf Sa'ad. Retaliating against the
attack, the DFLP, PLO and LNM attacked the town of Damour,
killing over 330 people. Arafat and Abu Jihad, who did not
support the attack in Damour, blamed themselves for not
managing to prevent the carnage.
On March 11, 1978, around ten Fatah fighters hijacked a bus
and sprayed gunfire inside and at passing vehicles on the road
connecting Haifa with Tel Aviv. T he brutal incident killed thirtyseven civilians. T he Civil War ended and Arafat was sent to
exile in Tunis.

Pe ace -Proce ss
T he policymakers in the United States recognized that
agreement on Israeli-Palestinian negotiations wasnt possible
until the Arab states took steps toward peace with Israel. In
1991, U.S. Secretary of State James Baker persuaded Israel
and her neighbors to attend a regional peace conference.
During the 1991 Madrid Conference, for the first time ever,
Israel conducted open negotiations with the PLO. But they did
not reach any consensus.

T hereafter, Israelis and PLO began negotiating over the issue
and ultimately reached an agreement to give the Palestinians
self-rule in Gaza and Jericho, followed by autonomy in other
parts of the territories. On September 13, 1993, officials of both
Israel and Palestine signed the Declaration of Principles in
Washington, D.C. In 1994, Yasser Arafat was awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize along with Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin.

In 1994, Arafat moved to the PNA controlled Gaza City and
became the President and Prime Minister of the Palestinian
National Authority. In July 1994, the PNA was declared the
official government of the Palestine. Yasser Arafat established
an executive committee of twenty members and empowered
himself with liberty to replace and assign mayors and city

councils. Arafat appointed himself chairman of the Palestinian

financial organization, created by the World Bank to control
most aid money towards helping the new Palestinian entity.
Arafat also formed Preventive Security Service, the police force
of the state of Palestine.

Controv e rsie s and Last Day s of life
In August 2003, the International Monetary Fund, in an audit
claimed that Arafat had diverted $900 million in public funds to a
special bank account controlled by Arafat and the PNA Chief
Economic Financial adviser. Former Middle East negotiator for
the United States of America, Dennis Ross, had once said that
Arafat was "walking-around money". A major controversy
erupted between officials of the PNA and Suha, Arafats wife,
when officials from the PNA traveled to France to see Yasser.
Suha accused that they were trying to bury Yasser alive.

On October 25, 2004, Yasser Arafat was admitted to the hospital
after he vomited during a meeting. His condition continued to
decline and he was flown to a French hospital jet to in Clamart,
Paris. On November 11, 2004, the doctors pronounced the
death of Yasser Arafat. T he exact cause of his illness is still
unknown.