European court rejects attempt to reopen investigation into Yasser Arafat's death

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has dismissed a case brought by the widow and daughter of Yasser Arafat, who have said the late Palestinian leader died as a result of poisoning and sought to reopen an investigation into his death.

Suha El Kodwa Arafat and Zahwa El Kodwa Arafat filed their case with the Strasbourg-based European court in 2017 after French courts dismissed their assertions that Arafat had been the victim of premeditated murder.

Arafat's family had argued they had been refused their right to a fair hearing, in particular a refusal of their request for an additional expert report on his death. 

In a ruling issued on Thursday, the ECHR claimed there had been no infringement on the right to a fair hearing and the complaint filed by the family was "manifestly ill-founded".

Three judges alleged that after reviewing the case, “at all stages of the proceedings, the applicants, assisted by their lawyers, had been able to exercise their rights effectively.”

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Arafat died in Percy military hospital near Paris aged 75 in November 2004 after developing stomach pains while at his headquarters in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.

Many Palestinians and Palestinian officials have repeatedly accused the Israeli regime of masterminding what they say was an assassination of their leader. The Tel Aviv regime flatly denies the charge and has denied any involvement.

In 2011, Arafat's widow Suha handed over some of the Palestinian leader's personal effects to a reporter from Qatar-based Al Jazeera television news network, who passed them to the Institute of Applied Radiophysics in the Swiss city of Lausanne for tests.

A 108-page report by the institute found unnaturally high levels of polonium in Arafat's ribs and pelvis, and in soil stained with his decaying organs.

But it stopped short of saying that he had been poisoned by the substance.

Suha Arafat filed suit in 2012 at the Nanterre court near Paris.

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According to French doctors, he died of a massive stroke, although the origin of his illness was unknown.

Arafat’s tomb in Ramallah was opened the same year, so that three teams of French, Swiss, and Russian investigators could collect samples for investigation.

French experts later claimed that the isotopes polonium-210 and lead-210, found in Arafat’s grave and in the samples, were of “an environmental nature”, as was suggested by the Swiss finding.

However, separate probes from Swiss and Russian experts found that Arafat had been poisoned to death with polonium.

Polonium-210 is a highly radioactive substance. It is found naturally in low doses in food and in the body, but can be fatal if ingested in high doses.

Lawyers for Arafat’s widow said the investigation had been “fundamentally biased” and accused the judges of closing the probe too quickly.

“The lack of investigation leads inevitably to the conclusion that there is insufficient evidence,” the lawyers said, calling for more experts to be questioned.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his longtime rival, Mohammed Dahlan, have both accused each other of complicity in Arafat’s death in the past.

Certain Arab countries are reportedly pressuring the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) chairman to allow Dahlan, who has been in exile in the United Arab Emirates, to return to the West Bank amid talk of who will succeed Abbas.

Back in May 2018, the online news portal, Middle East Eye, said that Israel as well as the UAE, Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia were planning to overthrow Abbas and replace him with Dahlan. 

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