Yasser Arafat

Yasser Arafat (Arabic: ???? ?????‎) (August 4 or August 24, 1929 – November 11, 2004), born Muhammad `Abd ar-Ra'uf al-Qudwa al-Husayni (???? ??? ?????? ?????? ???????) and also known as Abu `Ammar (??? ?????), was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) (1969–2004); President{{fn|1}} of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) (1993–2004); and a co-winner of the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize.

Early life

Arafat was the fifth or sixth (sources disagree) of seven children. His father was a Palestinian textile merchant and his mother came from a prominent Palestinian family.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Arafat claimed to have been born in Jerusalem on August 4, 1929; some of his legal personal documentation states the same. A birth certificate registered in Cairo, Egypt shows August 24, 1929 as his date of birth and Cairo as the place. According to one Arafat biography, this birth certificate was filed in Cairo by his father so Arafat could attend school there. http://www.britannica.com/nobel/micro/30_1.html http://nobelprize.org/peace/laureates/1994/arafat-bio.html

Related Topics:
Jerusalem - August 4 - Cairo - Egypt - August 24 - 1929

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Arafat was four when his mother died, and he and his father moved to Jerusalem from Cairo, where the family had been living. In Jerusalem, they lived in a house near the Western Wall and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, a holy site to Jews, Christians and Muslims. At the age of eight, his father re-married and the family moved back to Cairo. The marriage did not last, and when his father married once more, Arafat's sister Inam was left in charge of the upbringing of her siblings.

Related Topics:
Western Wall - Al-Aqsa Mosque - Jews - Christian - Muslim

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Arafat attended the University of King Fuad I (later renamed Cairo University). He later claimed to have sought to better understand Judaism and Zionism by engaging in discussions with Jews and reading publications by Theodor Herzl and other Zionists. But by 1946 he had become a Palestinian nationalist and was procuring weapons in Egypt to be smuggled into Palestine in the Arab cause.http://cnnstudentnews.cnn.com/fyi/school.tools/profiles/Yasser.Arafat/student.storypage.html During the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, Arafat left the university and, along with other Palestinians, sought to enter Palestine to fight for Palestinian independence. He was disarmed and turned back by Egyptian military forces that refused to allow the poorly trained partisans to enter the war zone. Arafat felt that he had been "betrayed by these regimes". After returning to the university, Arafat joined the Muslim Brotherhood and served as president of the Union of Palestinian Students from 1952 to 1956. By 1956, Arafat graduated with a bachelor's degree in civil engineering and served as a second lieutenant in the Egyptian Army during the Suez Crisis.http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761560094/Arafat_Yasir.html Later in 1956, at a conference in Prague, he donned the keffiyeh, the traditional chequered head-dress which was to become his emblem.

Related Topics:
Cairo University - Judaism - Zionism - Theodor Herzl - 1946 - 1948 Arab-Israeli war - Muslim Brotherhood - 1952 - 1956 - Suez Crisis - Prague - Keffiyeh

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Arafat's younger brother Dr. Fathy Arafat, founded the Palestinian Red Crescent and was involved in the humanitarian aspect of the conflict.

Related Topics:
Fathy Arafat - Red Crescent

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~