By eitb24 - September 15, 2006

Fallaci became known for challenging interviews with such world leaders as former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

Veteran journalist and writer Oriana Fallaci, a former war correspondent best known for her uncompromising interviews and provocative stances, has died, Italian news reports said Friday. She was 76.

Fallaci, who was diagnosed with cancer years ago, died in a Florence hospital, the Italian agencies ANSA and Apcom said. The reports said she had been hospitalised for days.

The Rizzoli publishing house, which published her books, could not immediately confirm the reports.

Fallaci, a former Resistance fighter and war correspondent who was hardly seen in public, had lived in New York for years. During her journalistic career he became known for challenging interviews with such world leaders as former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Iran’s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Her work - both interviews and books - was translated across the world.

“Fallaci’s manner of interviewing was deliberately unsettling: she approached each encounter with studied aggressiveness, made frequent nods to European existentialism (she often disarmed her subjects with bald questions about death, God, and pity), and displayed a sinuous, crafty intelligence,” The New Yorker wrote in a profile on her this year entitled “The Agitator.”

Fallaci’s recent publications - including the best-selling book “The Rage and The Pride,” which came out weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001 - drew accusations of inciting hatred against Muslims.

“The Rage and The Pride,” sold more than 1 million copies in Italy and found a large audience elsewhere in Europe.