A second group of foreign doctors has found that Yasser Arafat, taken ill last week, was suffering from the flu, an Israeli Arab politician said, adding the Pales-tinian president was on the mend.

Ahmed Tibi, a member of Israel’s parliament and former adviser to Arafat, 75, said Tunisian doctors, who examined him on Saturday, made the same diagnosis as Egyptian physicians who saw him earlier last week. “The results of the Egyptian and Tunisian checkups are the same: an acute viral infection”, Tibi, also a doctor, said on Israeli Army Radio. “He is recuperating from an acute case of the flu”, he said, adding that he had visited Arafat on Friday.

Israel’s Channel Two television had said on Saturday that both teams of doctors had concluded that Arafat was suffering from gallstones and had an intestinal infection. The television station said Arafat, effectively confined by Israel to his headquarters in West Bank city of Ramallah for nearly three years, would probably need to travel abroad for surgery.

But Saeb Erekat, a Palestinian cabinet minister, denied the Israeli reports that Arafat needed an operation and told Reuters that he looked well on the way to recovery yesterday at a meeting of the national security council. “During the meeting, he was handling the matters very well. At one point he screamed (at someone),” said Erekat.

Israel has said Arafat is free to leave Ramallah but cannot guarantee it will allow him to return. Israel has accused Arafat of fomenting violence in the Palestinian uprising that began in 2000, an allegation he denies. Arafat has long been rumoured to suffer from Parkinson’s disease. Aides say he suffers from neurological injuries caused by a near-fatal plane crash in Libya in 1992.

Palestinian sources said Arafat was suffering last week from a high fever and nausea, forcing him to cancel several meetings and miss prayers at the start of the Muslim holy month. They said he had since recovered but needs rest. Arafat has refused to heed doctors’ orders not to fast during Ramadan, when Muslims abstain from food and drink during daylight hours, Tibi said. Arafat is also attended by Palestinian doctors who visit him at his headquarters.