Wife says Arafat is really OK, rips aides

CLAMART, France — Yasser Arafat's wife said her husband is "all right" and lashed out at his top lieutenants early today, accusing them of traveling to Paris with plans to "bury" him "alive."

In a screaming telephone call from Arafat's hospital bedside, Suha Arafat told pan-Arab Al-Jazeera television that she was issuing "an appeal to the Palestinian people." She accused his top aides, who are traveling to Paris later today, of conspiring to usurp her husband's four-decade-long role as Palestinian leader.

"Let it be known to the honest Palestinian people that a bunch of those who want to inherit are coming to Paris," she shouted in Arabic, in her first public comments since Arafat fell ill a month ago.

"You have to realize the size of the conspiracy. I tell you they are trying to bury Abu Ammar alive," she said, using Arafat's nom de guerre. He is all right and he is going home. God is great."

A producer from Al-Jazeera told The Associated Press the station was confident it was Suha Arafat on the phone. She first called the network's Ramallah office and then its headquarters in Qatar.

Despite her insistence that Arafat, 75, was fine, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier on Sunday called the Palestinian leader's condition "very complex, very serious and stable right now."

Palestinians have been making contingency plans for the event of his death, and Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia, Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath and Mahmoud Abbas, the former prime minister and deputy chairman of Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization, were due in Paris today to consult with his doctors and French officials.

In Jerusalem, Israeli officials said on Sunday preparations were complete for Arafat to be buried in the Gaza Strip.

Jamil Tarifi, the Palestinian minister of civil affairs, told Al- Jazeera the group was initially hesitant about going but that the executive committee decided the trip would help "reassure" worried Palestinians. He did not comment on Suha Arafat's charges.

Some Palestinians have complained that Suha Arafat has gained too much power as she controls the flow of information about Arafat's condition and has taken charge of access to the ailing leader.

"She is not part of the Palestinian leadership," Arafat security adviser Jibril Rajoub told Israel's Channel Two TV on Sunday.

Suha Arafat, 41, who lives in Paris, has not been to the West Bank or seen her husband since the latest round of Palestinian violence began in 2000. She rarely speaks to the media.