This file picture shows an aerial view of the illegal Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on June 25, 2023. (Photo by Reuters)
US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner's firm is now the biggest shareholder in the Israeli company which funds the construction of illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories
The investment firm called Affinity Partners is headed by Kushner and funded by Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
Kushner’s firm has received several billion dollars in funding from the Persian Gulf states’ sovereign wealth funds since it was launched by Kushner in 2021.
Affinity Partners has secured further funding from the Qatari Investment Authority (QIA) and an Abu Dhabi-based investment firm. It has also completed the purchase of a near-10 percent stake in Phoenix Financial.
Phoenix is an Israeli financial services group that offers insurance and asset management services, and holds shares in other Israeli companies in its own name and through a subsidiary, Phoenix Investment House.
An investigation by Middle East Eye has established that these include 11 public companies and one private company currently named in a database of businesses with links to Israeli settlements in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.
The businesses include banks and companies involved in telecommunications, transport, energy, engineering, and retail.
Phoenix’s total holdings in the 11 public companies are currently valued at around $4.5 billion.
Kushner, who is considered to be close to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was a key architect during Trump’s first term of the so-called Abraham Accords which established diplomatic ties between Israel and several Arab states including the UAE.
He has spoken openly of his support for, and desire to invest in Israel, and his hopes for a future normalization deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Phoenix Financial has financed and insured construction projects throughout illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and the Syrian Golan Heights.
According to the NGO watchdog Who Profits, Phoenix also owns an 80 percent stake in a large shopping mall in an illegal East al-Quds settlement and stakes in various companies operating throughout other settlements.
Kushner served as his father-in-law’s senior White House adviser in his first term and played a key role in the Abraham Accords that normalized relations between Tel Aviv and four Arab countries in 2020.
North of 700,000 Israelis live in over 230 settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the West Bank and East al-Quds.
The international community views the settlements as illegal under international law and the Geneva Conventions due to their construction on the occupied territories.
