身患重病的巴勒斯坦民族权力机构主席阿拉法特10月28日表示同意前往法国巴黎治病。这将是他被以色列软禁两年多以来首次离开位于约旦河西岸城市拉马拉的官邸。据美联社报道，现年75岁的阿拉法特27日突然病重。一个不愿透露姓名的知情人士说，阿拉法特的身体非常虚弱，28日大部分时间在睡觉，醒着的时候无法站立，只能坐在轮椅里。他有时候意识模糊，认不出来访的人。

Ailing Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is suffering from a low blood platelet count and will be flown to Paris on Friday for medical treatment.

The Palestinian Authority, the prime minister and legislative council will take over leadership in his absence.

Arab doctors have been examining Mr Arafat, 75, at his half-ruined compound in the West Bank town of Ramallah.

Mr Arafat will fly by helicopter to the Jordanian capital Amman, then to Paris.

Nabil abu Rudeinah said that Palestinian officials were satisfied that Israel would allow Mr Arafat to return to Ramallah when his medical condition allowed.

Guarantees had been obtained from the US, Europe and the Arab world and agreed to by Israel, he added.

Earlier, the French presidency said that France will send a plane to pick up Mr Arafat.

Jordanian helicopters will take the Palestinian leader to Amman from his Muqata compound in Ramallah at dawn on Friday.

Sources inside his Ramallah headquarters said Paris was a serious option because of its advanced medical facilities.

Mr Arafat's doctor, Ashraf Kurdi, confirmed that the veteran leader was suffering from low blood platelets and needed further tests.

He insisted that Mr Arafat had not been poisoned and was not suffering from leukaemia .

Washington has said it hopes Mr Arafat will get the "medical care that he needs to return to health".

Suha Arafat, the leader's wife, arrived at the compound on Thursday to see her husband for the first time in four years.

Her arrival from France came as Palestinian officials released video of her husband sitting in the company of doctors.

Dressed in a light blue tracksuit and a woolly hat, Mr Arafat is shown wan and pale but smiling in the footage, said to have been shot at 1300 local time (1100 GMT).

Israel, which has long held Mr Arafat responsible for militant violence, is probably keen not to be seen as responsible in any way for the death of the Palestinian leader.

Israeli sources said they were treating the matter as a humanitarian issue.

Earlier reports spoke of severe flu and possible gallstone trouble.

There is a huge sense among Palestinians that this is a moment of crisis, the BBC's Alan Johnston reports from Gaza City, where he spoke to people in Palestine Square.

He says there is little talk now of Mr Arafat's failings as an administrator and ordinary Palestinians are very much hoping that the old man, as they often call him, will pull through .

In Ramallah, shoe merchant Jawad Juda, 50, told Reuters news agency that Mr Arafat was "the head of the whole Palestinian household".

"I'm afraid if he dies, there will be no authority - it will be a catastrophe for our people," he added.

Having led the Palestinian struggle for statehood for nearly 40 years, Mr Arafat is seen by Palestinians as an irreplaceable figurehead , the BBC's Lucy Williamson reports from Jerusalem.

As perhaps the only person capable of uniting the many different Palestinian groups, he has no obvious successor.