In southern Africa, the black Africans have a sardonic name for their corrupt leaders. They call them the “waBenzi” — the “People of the Mercedes-Benz” –who drive their luxury vehicles up and down the handful of paved roads in the countries they rule over, the countries from whose treasuries they help themselves to the money they need to pay for their African palaces, their Riviera villas, and of course, for those Mercedes-Benzes that give them their names.
But there is another tribe of the waBenzi who have outdone any African leader in the scale of their corruption. These are the leaders of Hamas and the Palestine Authority, and before them, that past master of corruption, the PLO’s head Yasser Arafat. At Arafat’s death, he left a fortune estimated at between one and three billion dollars; the Israelis think he may have been down to his last billion but no one is sure, and no one knows what happened to any of it, save for that handful of Palestinians close to Arafat who managed to help themselves to whatever they could get their hands on. His long-time financial advisor, Mohamed Rashid, quit his employ in 2003, but has been a continuous source of information about various secret bank accounts held by Arafat. What is certain is that no matter what money may have been recovered, it is not going to the people but, rather, to the well-connected in the Palestinian hierarchy. The higher up you are, the more money you are allowed to steal.
Mahmoud Abbas has not been quite as successful in accumulating wealth as was Arafat, but give him time: he’s only been in office, as head of the PLO, since 2004, and as head of the Palestine Authority since 2005. That has given him only 14 years to help himself to money, while Arafat was head of the PLO for several decades. With his two sons Tarek and Yasser, Mahmoud Abbas has managed to amass a business empire that, as of two years ago, was reported to be worth $400 million; it must have gone up in value since. One wonders what would happen if the Palestinians were fully cognizant of how much money that was meant for them– aid money from the U.S., E.U., and Arab countries — has been siphoned off, first by Arafat and then by his successor Mahmoud Abbas.
Then there is Hamas, whose leaders deserve some kind of prize for the sheer size of their defalcations. Mousa Abu Marzouk, once the No. 2 in Hamas, and a fund-raiser, diverted to himself large amounts of what he raised; his personal fortune is said to be between two and three billion dollars. According to Col. (res.) Dr. Moshe Elad, a lecturer in the Middle East Department of the Western Galilee Academic College, here is how the Hamas bonanza happened:
“The vast majority of Hamas founders and leaders were refugees or second generation refugees, and some of them were the product of marriages between Egyptians and Palestinians. They had no money at all. When they and Hamas were just starting out, the organization (not in its own name) was nurtured by the Israeli military government, which fostered the Islamic associations working in the Gaza Strip as a counterweight to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). Their phenomenal wealth started accumulating when they decided to disassociate themselves from Israel and search for alternative financing sources.”
“Elad explains that the money came from two directions: “Legacies from the deceased; money from charity funds; a donation called zaka, one of the six pillars of Islam; and donations from various countries. It started with Syria and Saudi Arabia, with Iran added later and becoming one of Hamas’s biggest supporters, and ended with Qatar, which has now taken Iran’s place.”
“Together with the donations from various countries, fundraisers began operating in the US to collect money for Hamas. Here, the Hamas leaders began to get their hands on some really big money. ‘One of those fundraisers was Dr. Musa Abu Marzook, the number 2 man in Hamas,’ Elad says. ‘At the beginning of the 1990s, he began a fundraising campaign in the US among wealthy Muslims, while at the same time founding several banking enterprises. He himself became a conglomerate of 10 financial enterprises giving loans and making financial investments. He’s an amazing financier.’”
“The US administration ordered Marzook’s arrest in 1995 on charges of supporting terrorism. After he spent two years in a US prison, it was decided to expel him without trial. He kept the money. ‘When he was expelled from the US in 1997, he was already worth several million dollars,’ Elad says, adding, ‘Somehow he evaded the clutches of the US Internal Revenue Service and was not charged with financing terrorism. People in the know say he probably became connected to the administration and cooperated with it. There is no proof, but it’s hard to think of any other reason why he escaped punishment for such serious offenses. In 2001, in the investigation of the September 11 events, it turned out that he had extensive financial connections with Al Qaeda, including the transfer of funds to the 21 Al Qaeda operatives accused of the attacks.’”
Today, Marzook is considered one of Hamas’s wealthiest billionaires. ‘Arab sources estimate his wealth at $2-3 billion,’ Elad says.”
‘“Even better off is Khaled Meshaal, whose worth is estimated at between $2.5 and $5 billion dollars. “Estimates around the world are that Mashaal is currently worth $2.6 billion, but the numbers mentioned by the Arab commentators (based on their many sources) are much higher, varying from $2-5 billion invested in Egyptian and Persian Gulf banks, and some in real estate projects in the Persian Gulf countries,” Elad adds.”
“The next tycoon on the list is Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh. “He is a scion of a family from the Al-Shati refugee camp, and his capital is estimated at $4 million,” Elad says, adding, “He registered most of his assets in the Gaza Strip in the name of his son-in-law, Nabil, and in the name of a dozen of his sons and daughters and a few less well known Hamas leaders. They all have homes in good neighborhoods in the Gaza Strip, where the value of every home is at least $1 million.’” [As of 2019, other sources give Haniyeh’s net worth as $10 million]
“Another wealthy Hamas official – Iman Haha – is not on the organization’s highest levels, but he, too, (and other junior managers) is feeding from the trough. According to Elad, ‘He was a poor rebellious kid from the al-Borg refugee camp, but he recently built a home in central Gaza worth at least $1 million. He’s responsible for coordination between oversea Hamas and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and he’s not even a leading figure, but he’s already among the millionaires.’”
“The Asharq Al-Awsat (Middle East) newspaper, one of the most prestigious in the Arab world, recently reported that at least 600 millionaires were living in the Gaza Strip – the same people sitting on the money pipelines there.
But it’s not only their cut of the aid money that fills the pockets of Palestinian waBenzi.