The Jerusalem Post republishes a report alleging what has been rumored over the past week — that the reason Yasser Arafat’s wife Suha was holding out on declaring him dead was to increase her post-Arafat financial position (emphasis added),
Yasser Arafat’s widow, Suha, is expected to receive a sum of $22 million a year out of the Palestinian Authority budget, according to the Italian newspaper Corriere De La Serra.
The paper said Suha reached an agreement about the money during a meeting with Mahmoud Abbas, the PLO’s newly elected chairman, who visited while she was staying next to her husband’s bed in the French military hospital outside Paris.
It said Abbas personally promised Suha that she would receive $22 million a year to cover her expenses in Paris. The paper noted that in July Arafat transferred to his wife $11 million to cover her living costs for the first six months of the year.
Abbas and the Palestinian leadership were forced to strike the deal with Suha after she refused to allow them to visit her husband in hospital.
$22 million for Suha while the per capita income in the Palestinian Authority hovers at around $1,000.
Source:
Report: Suha to receive $ 22m. a year from PA. Jerusalem Post, November 11, 2004.