An analysis of the confidential medical report on Yasser Arafat's death indicates three main possibilities as to the cause: poisoning, AIDS or an infection.
According to Haaretz, Israeli and foreign doctors who have seen the report claim the details do not lead to a conclusive determination on what caused the death.
Arafat died on November 11, 2004 in Paris. The report's findings were now being published for the first time in the revised edition of book by two Israeli journalists.
The report lists the immediate cause of death as a massive brain hemorrhage, but adds that "a discussion among a large number of medical experts... shows that it is impossible to pinpoint a cause that will explain the combination of symptoms that led to the death of the patient."
Dr. Ashraf al-Kurdi, Arafat's personal physician, said that he knows that the French doctors found the AIDS virus in Arafat's blood. Al-Kurdi claims that the virus was put into Arafat's blood in a bid to blur the traces of poisoning.
Senior Palestinian officials, including Mohammed Dahlan and Jibril Rajoub, have said in interviews with the book's authors that they are convinced Arafat was poisoned by Israel.
On Thursday, The New York Times reported that Arafat died from a stroke that resulted from a bleeding disorder caused by an unidentified infection. The records, obtained by The New York Times, suggests that poisoning was highly unlikely and dispels a rumor that he may have died of AIDS. Nonetheless, the records show that despite extensive testing, his doctors could not determine the underlying infection.
