Mohamed Al Fayed

Mohamed Abdel Moneim Al-Fayed[a] (/ælˈfaɪ.ɛd/; in Arabic: محمد الفايد, born January 27, 1929 in Alexandria and died August 30, 2023 in London) was an Arab Muslim Egyptian billionaire businessman, based in the United Kingdom.

Billionaire

He was the owner of London department store Harrods (the largest shop in the United Kingdom) and Fulham FC football team.

Al Fayed, who achieved wealth through his first marriage into the Kashoggi family of arms dealers. At the time of his death in 2023, Forbes estimated his wealth at US$2 billion.

Application for British nationality turned down, al-Fayed lied

Mohamed moved to Britain in 1974 and has since attempted repeatedly to obtain British nationality. His applications have been turned down by Conservative and Labour governments on the grounds that he is not of good character. He has been involved in a number of high-profile scandals. In 1990 the British Department of Trade and Industry found that al Fayed had lied about his background and assets during the takeover by him and his brother of the House of Fraser Group, parent company of Harrods, in 1985. He also paid MPs, notably the Conservative Neil Hamilton, to ask questions on his behalf in the House of Commons.

Remorseless, ruthless, racist

The UK editor of Vanity Fair, from the 1990s amassed appalling testimonies about the Harrods owner of sex abuse, racism and spying on staff.

Vanity Fair editor:

From 1995 to 1997, I and the lawyer David Hooper, of Biddle & Co, investigated Fayed, who had sued Vanity Fair and our reporter Maureen Orth over a profile that alleged he was a serial abuser and a racist, and that he spied on his staff, bugging their phones and using hidden cameras.

As the Vanity Fair article came out - reporting that included charges of racial discrimination, bugging employees phones and enforcing HIV testing, Al Fayed first tried a "libel lawsuit" no less, then he dropped it two years later.

Arab lobby's pressure

In January 2003, Mohamed Al Fayed's Herrods acceded to a request from the Council for the Advancement of Arab British Understanding (CAABU) and removed from its shelves Israeli products that might have originated in Gaza or the West Bank.

However, in the wake of strong protests, Harrods once again stocked the products, but with stickers affixed noting where they came from.

Monster rapist

From 1997 onwards, Fayed was the subject of media scrutiny and investigations into accusations of sexual harassment and assault.

Vanity Fair editor said, that in the 1990s:

So much evidence was available and yet he was only seriously questioned once about sex abuse, after a teenage assistant at Harrods complained to the police of an assault in his office. At the time, she was 15 and he was nearly 80.

In 2024, he became the subject of multiple posthumous accusations of rape. "Number of women who say Mohamed Al Fayed assaulted them soars above 150 as Harrods worker says line manager 'brushed off' her complaint." Described as a real monster. Likened to infamous Jimny Savile. 'Harrods led us like lambs to the slaughter': "Survivors reveal Mohamed Al-Fayed's abuse - as they reveal chill." At least one "Harrods worker says 'monster' Fayed raped her at 16." Former flight attendant Jerri MacDonald tells tells how her dream job on the former Harrods owner's private jet turned into a nightmare, Mohamed al Fayed had her sacked after she refused to sleep with him.

Enablers

Allegations of company-enabled sexual abuse raise big questions: Why did Mohamed Al Fayed escape scrutiny?

Fayed security chief accused of facilitating abuse: 'He knew what Mohamed was doing.' Multiple women say John Macnamara – the ex-detective whose job was to shut down allegations about Fayed – sought to break their will to speak out.

Dodi

In 1997 his son Dodi Fayed began a relationship with Diana, Princess of Wales. On 31 August 1997 an al Fayed employee, Henri Paul, driving while under the influence of alcohol, was at the wheel of the car which crashed killing himself, Dodi and Diana. Mohammed al Fayed has since tried to blame this accident on the British secret service and royal family.

Craved ‘establishment’ approval and claimed "Islamohobia"

Mohamed craved ‘establishment’ approval. His son Dodi’s fateful relationship with princess Diana might have been the moment Fayed finally gained acceptance by the British “Establishment” elite. Instead it marked his permanent estrangement after he insisted — without evidence — that Queen Elizabeth II’s husband Prince Philip had ordered the Paris car crash in which Diana and Dodi were killed to prevent her from marrying a Muslim.

This theory was also pushed by Abdel Bari Atwan (Holocaust denier & pro terror racist Palestinian Arab journalist)

When Al-Fayed, in 2000, attacked the photographers, it was put by their lawyer: "Of course I understand Mr Al Fayed's need to find someone to blame, but he is contradictory. On the one hand he says it was all a conspiracy. But how can you square that with putting the blame on the photographers?"

An official UK police 2006 inquiry into the Paris car crash which killed Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed has found no evidence the couple were "murdered."

In 2017

• Book promised new revelations about Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed's deaths.
• It was written by Michael Cole, who (at the time) works for Dodi's father Mohamed Al Fayed.
• But Mr Al Fayed intervened so 'Diana and Dodi: The Truth' will not be published.
• It means the book's potentially scandalous contents may never be revealed.

Death

Fayed was buried with son Dodi after Islamic Friday prayers at London Central Mosque in Regent's Park.

Following his death, Conservative Neil Hamilton in a scathing attack blasted Mohamed: 'Psychopathic LIAR!’