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Now that the exhumation and reburial of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is complete, the wait for results on cause of death begins. Suspicions that Israel poisoned him are widespread, and the results will put to rest eight years of questions about his rapid health deterioration and subsequent death.

Israel has vehemently denied being responsible for Mr. Arafat's death, and has even called for Palestinian officials to release his medical records to bolster their claims. No autopsy was performed at the time, leaving doctors unable to determine the cause of death. When traces of polonium were found in July on some of Mr. Arafat's belongings that had been handed over to Al Jazeera, it revived the dormant debate, Agence France-Presse reports.

Even before the polonium discovery, many Palestinians suspected Israel was behind Arafat's death, according to AFP. Although he eventually signed a peace agreement with Israel, for a long time he was considered a terrorist by most Israelis for his many years of leading Palestinian resistance to Israel. 

Early this morning, forensic experts removed samples from his corpse, buried in Ramallah in the West Bank. Reuters reports that an analysis of the results isn't expected until March or April 2013. Suspicions are boosted by the fact that Israel kept Arafat confined to his headquarters in Ramallah for the last 2.5 years of his life.

"We need to find the truth. It was very suspicious how he died, just like that, under siege from the Israelis," Ghada Nayfeh told the Guardian.

The debate was revived when Arafat's widow, Suha, provided some of his belongings for a documentary and a Swiss institute found traces of polonium on them. However, there are still substantial doubts.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's spokesman Mark Regev dismissed the suspicions this summer. "Israel was not involved in the death of Arafat," he said in July, according to a separate AFP report. "All the medical files are in the hands of the Palestinians and it was not Israel who is preventing their publication."

Although many Palestinians still clamor for answers, many disagree with reopening the debate, AFP reports.

In an editorial today, The Jerusalem Post excoriated those behind the exhumation.

But the Dubai-based newspaper The National makes the opposite argument in an editorial, insisting that whatever the results, they will provide much-needed closure.

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