"It is over thirty years since Yasser Arafat swept onto the world stage as leader of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, a machine gun in one hand and an olive branch in the other. In that time he has become many things to many people; to ordinary Israelis a terrorist godfather whose desire for the complete annihilation of their state is only thinly veiled; to previous US administrations a Nobel Peace Prize-winner and the only Palestinian to do business with; to the Bush Whitehouse, a pariah once more." "Fully up to date, and based on hundreds of frank and revealing interviews with senior Israeli and Palestinian officials, including Arafat himself, Arafat: The Biography examines his once-triumphant transition from terrorist to statesman, and his subsequent marginalisation following the tragic collapse of the Oslo Peace Accords. The book examines the charge that the bitter personal blood-feud between Arafat and Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is itself a major obstacle to peace in the Middle-East. It separates Arafat the man from Arafat the myth, and offers a penetrating, balanced insight into the international and intelligence links, and the internal machinery, of the Palestinian regime."--Jacket.