MIDDLE EAST: French prosecutors have begun an inquiry into transfers totalling €9 million into bank accounts held in France by Suha Arafat, the wife of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.
The Paris public prosecutor confirmed a report in Le Canard Enchaine magazine that an inquiry into Suha Arafat, who lives in Paris, was launched last October after information provided by the Bank of France and a government anti-money laundering body.
The prosecutor's office said they wanted to check transfers from a Swiss-based institution made between July 2002 and July 2003 into two separate accounts held by her in Paris.
Suha Arafat could not be contacted for comment, but Yasser Arafat has rejected allegations of corruption within his Palestinian Authority. Yet it has suffered a fall in foreign donor money amid allegations that some of it has been siphoned off by corrupt officials or diverted to militants waging a suicide bombing campaign against Israel.
On Saturday more than 300 members of his ruling Fatah movement resigned collectively, demanding greater democracy within Fatah and the Palestinian Authority and an end to corruption.
Meanwhile yesterday, the Israeli army's most senior intelligence officer criticised Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan unilaterally to evacuate most of the Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip, saying it would be perceived as a victory for extremism and so might "motivate further terrorism".
Briefing the Knesset's foreign affairs and defence committee, Maj Gen Aharon Ze'evi-Farkash, also said the pullout might reduce the motivation of groups like Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Fatah-linked Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.
But members emerged from the meeting with the strong impression that he was warning against the unilateral move. The intelligence chief also predicted that an Israeli departure from the Gaza Strip, where 7,500 Jewish settlers live among 1.3 million Palestinians, would leave a vacuum which would be contested by different Palestinian groupings.
Mr Sharon said earlier this month that he was planning for the evacuation of 17 of the 20 Gaza settlements. He gave no timetable, but aides have suggested summer or autumn. He also said he saw no long-term future for any Jewish residents of the densely populated Strip.
Talk of a withdrawal has been welcomed by the Palestinian Authority. But on the Israeli left, where a Gaza pullout has been urged for years, many sceptics doubt Mr Sharon will turn the rhetoric into action. On the right, many former loyalists fear he will.
Leftwing Knesset member Mr Yossi Sarid, former head of the Meretz party, emerged from yesterday's briefing unconvinced that the prime minister intends to carry out the withdrawal, but also unconvinced by Gen Ze'evi-Farkash's warning against it.
Additional reporting by Reuters