A review of the millions of Mossack Fonseca & Co. documents exposed last week reveals the PA fortune club, most of whose members are not necessarily known to the Israeli or American readers. Ha’aretz on Friday published the results of its examination of the documents, which revealed, for instance, that the son of PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas held stock worth some $1 million in a company that was tied to the PA.
The company, Arab Palestinian Investment Company, was registered in the British Virgin Island in September, 1994. Its first meeting of the board of directors took place on May 24, 1995, at the Dubai Sheraton. The stated purpose of the new company was to create jobs for PA Arabs, so they would not have to depend on the Israeli market. Over the past 20 years, APIC has become an economic giant in local PA terms, owned in part by the Palestinian Investment Fund, which is connected to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
In 2011, a new member was added to APIC’s board of directors: Tarek Abbas, son of you know who. And while his board membership is a matter of public knowledge, the Panama papers reveal that he owned APIC stock worth $982 thousand.
It is interesting to note that the personnel changes at the help of APIC matched changes in the PA leadership. For instance, Mohammed Rashid, a financier who was close to former PA Chairman Yasser Arafat, was appointed to the APIC board in 2000, while serving as CEO of the PIF. Then, about a month after the demise of Arafat, in December 2004, Rashid left his post at APIC. Then, in 2006, Abbas issued an edict making PIF part of his office, and Rashid was out of that job as well. Then, as often happens in Areas A and B of Judea and Samaria, in 2012 Rashid was convicted of stealing millions from the very PIF he was running.
Stay tuned for more embarrassing revelations.