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High­light­ing the struc­tural eco­nomic con­nec­tions between the Bush fam­ily and the Saudi elite, this broad­cast devel­ops some of the busi­ness and para-political rela­tion­ships that W’s rel­a­tives have with the milieu impli­cated in the attacks of 9/11. These struc­tural eco­nomic rela­tion­ships enable and, to a cer­tain extent, pre­cip­i­tate the con­spir­a­to­r­ial processes of which the events of 9/11 are a part.

1. Dis­cus­sion begins with a com­plex and highly ques­tion­able busi­ness deal that may dam­age the rep­u­ta­tion of Mar­vin Bush, the President’s younger brother. “Early in 1996, a Mex­i­can invest­ment group with ties to the gov­ern­ment received sev­eral pre­lim­i­nary bids, some worth more than $250 mil­lion, to acquire the equity of Fresh Del Monte Pro­duce, the global grower of bananas, pineap­ples and other fruit and veg­eta­bles. But just as the investors-who had taken con­trol after their orig­i­nal chair­man had become a fugitive-were about to close a deal, the group’s board abruptly sold Del Monte to a little-known com­pany run by Pales­tini­ans for a much lower price. The terms were so unfa­vor­able, a num­ber of minor­ity investors thought at the time, that they tried, unsuc­cess­fully, to block the sale.” (“Law­suit Says Del Monte Sale Was Rigged” by Anthony De Palma and Diana B. Hen­riques; The New York Times; 12/19/2002; p. C1.)

2. In addi­tion to Khalid Bin Mah­fouz (a mem­ber of a pow­er­ful Saudi fam­ily, busi­ness asso­ciate of the Bush fam­ily and defen­dant in a law­suit filed by sur­vivors of the 9/11 attacks) the story involves a Chilean-based Pales­tin­ian, Moham­mad Abu-Ghazaleh and his Pales­tin­ian com­pany the IAT group. (As will be seen later, Bin Mah­fouz is not impli­cated in the alleged wrong­do­ing.) “A law­suit filed in a Miami court yes­ter­day by seven pri­vate and cor­po­rate minor­ity investors includes alle­ga­tions that may shed light on why Del Monte was sold for so much less than it seemed to be worth. The suit accuses Moham­mad Abu-Ghazaleh and his Pales­tin­ian com­pany, a pow­er­ful Mex­i­can politi­cian who was chair­man of the invest­ment group and an impor­tant mem­ber of the country’s rul­ing party, to rig the sale in their favor. The law­suit is based in part on the affi­davit of an exec­u­tive who worked closely with Mr. Bours and who has evi­dence of a curi­ous pay­ment of $321,000 that ended up in Mr. Bours’s bank account after the sale was com­pleted. The suit con­tends that the amount rep­re­sents just a por­tion of a pay­off that Mr. Bours received to help the Abu-Ghazalehs buy Del Monte at bar­gain rates . . .” (Idem.)

3. Incor­po­rated in the Cay­man Islands, Fresh Del Monte Pro­duce has Mar­vin Bush on its board of direc­tors, although he has not been men­tioned in the law­suit. “Still, the alle­ga­tions of bribery and fraud may cause trou­ble for Fresh Del Monte Pro­duce, which is incor­po­rated in the Cay­man Islands and listed on the New York Stock Exchange. . . .And while there is no evi­dence against him, it could also prove awk­ward for Mar­vin P. Bush, a younger brother of the pres­i­dent, who has been on Del Monte’s board since 1998. Mar­vin Bush is not men­tioned in the suit, and he had no con­nec­tion to the com­pany at the time of the 1996 sale. He did not return sev­eral phone calls seek­ing com­ment.” (Ibid.; p. C6.)

4. The ques­tion­able deal involved an asso­ciate of for­mer Mex­i­can pres­i­dent Car­los Sali­nas de Gor­tari, him­self an asso­ciate of a cor­rupt Latino busi­ness milieu inti­mately involved in George W’s polit­i­cal and busi­ness oper­a­tions in Texas. (For more about “Los Ami­gos de Bush,” see FTR#281.) “Most of all, the suit opens a new chap­ter in the bizarre recent his­tory of Del Monte, dat­ing to even before its acqui­si­tion in 1992 by Car­los Cabal Peniche, the fugi­tive chair­man. At that time, asso­ciates say, Mr. Cabal turned to a spir­i­tual advi­sor to come up with a unique bid that invoked the Mayan spir­its of his home state Tabasco, in south­ern Mex­ico. . . .The pur­chase fit right into the plans of Pres­i­dent Car­los Sali­nas de Gor­tari, who was busy try­ing to mod­ern­ize Mexico’s old econ­omy and reform its agri­cul­tural sec­tor. Buy­ing Del Monte was seen as a way to give Mex­i­can pro­duce instant global recog­ni­tion. The gov­ern­ment pro­vided spe­cial financ­ing to a group of 150 Mex­i­can investors led by Mr. Cabal, a shrimp exporter who had already pur­chased two Mex­i­can banks with gov­ern­ment sup­port . . .” (Idem.)

5. Next, the dis­cus­sion high­lights the 1989 pur­chase of the Del Monte divi­sion by the com­pany of another Mid­dle East­ern financier, as well as Mr. Cabal’s indict­ment for bank fraud. “The fresh pro­duce divi­sion was pur­chased in 1989 by Polly Peck Inter­na­tional, a con­glom­er­ate run by Asil Nadir, a financier. But alle­ga­tions of fraud and finan­cial irreg­u­lar­i­ties caused Polly Peck to col­lapse, and Del Monte pro­duce was put up for sale again in 1992. But in 1994, Mr. Cabal, bleed­ing cash, was charged with bank fraud. When he fled Mex­ico, the gov­ern­ment seized the com­pany.” (Idem.)

6. After dis­cussing other bids for the com­pany, the pro­gram spot­lights the role of the Abu-Ghazaleh fam­ily and their IAT firm in the Del Monte imbroglio. “But the law­suit claims that their bids became moot as soon as the IAT Group entered the pic­ture. IAT, the third-largest fruit exporter in Chile, was con­trolled by the Abu-Ghazaleh fam­ily, Pales­tini­ans from Jerusalem with busi­ness inter­ests in the Mid­dle East. Moham­mad Abu-Ghazaleh, the cur­rent chair­man of Fresh Del Monte Pro­duce, had planted the family’s flag in Chile in the 1980’s, tak­ing advan­tage of Chile’s sea­sonal coun­ter­bal­ance to North Amer­ica.” (Idem.)

7. Although not impli­cated in wrong­do­ing in this case, the afore­men­tioned Khalid bin Mah­fouz was heav­ily involved with Mr. Cabal’s busi­ness ven­tures. “Del Monte also faces a threat­ened suit by East­brook Caribe, an off­shore invest­ment com­pany owned by Sheik Khalid bin Mah­fouz, a Saudi banker who financed many of Mr. Cabal’s acqui­si­tions in the late 1980’s . . .” (Idem.)

8. The pro­found role in the U.S. econ­omy of re-invested Saudi petrodol­lars is under­scored by the Bush family’s efforts on behalf of the Alireza fam­ily. Promi­nent investors in Florida real estate, they have recently sup­ple­mented their long-standing devel­op­ment projects in Orlando (Florida), adja­cent to Dis­ney World. As we shall see, Abdul­lah Alireza is also a direc­tor of DMI, one of the Saudi cap­i­tal invest­ments in the Al Shamal Bank, a finan­cial vehi­cle for Osama Bin Laden. “A $100 mil­lion con­ven­tion cen­ter and hotel project pro­posed by a promi­nent Saudi fam­ily has sunk under the weight of ten­u­ous alle­ga­tions of ties to pos­si­ble fund­ing for ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tions, a sign of the tense times Saudi busi­ness inter­ests face in the U.S.” (“Saudi Family’s Project Unrav­els In Florida Over Ter­ror­ist Fears” by Evan Perez and Christina Bink­ley; The Wall Street Jour­nal; 12/11/2002; p. C9.)

9. Xen­tury City-the Alireza fam­ily company-became the focal point of vehe­ment protest because of the DMI/Al Shamal/Bin Laden con­nec­tion. “Osce­ola County, near Orlando, was close to mak­ing a deal with Xen­tury City Devel­op­ment Co. to build a 500,000-square-foot con­ven­tion cen­ter and 1,000-room hotel, one of the largest such devel­op­ments in the works since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. How­ever, local fears that the wealthy Alireza fam­ily, back­ers of the project, may some­how have even indi­rect ties to Osama bin Laden stirred up a furor in this fast-growing region. The uproar was fueled by a hotel labor union that opposed Xen­tury City. Local offi­cials voted late Mon­day to aban­don talks with Xen­tury City and turn to another devel­oper, Land­mark Orga­ni­za­tion Inc., of Austin Texas.” (Idem.)

10. “The Alireza fam­ily has been devel­op­ing real estate near Dis­ney World, in the Orlando area, for 20 years, even donat­ing land to build a major express­way to ease access to the theme park. But that track record wasn’t enough to sur­mount the ter­ror­ism fears raised by a hotel union’s dis­clo­sure that Abdul­lah Alireza, the fam­ily patri­arch was a direc­tor in a Saudi bank that, through a sub­sidiary, held an inter­est in a Sudanese bank that the U.S. gov­ern­ment says was used by Osama bin Laden. . .” (Idem.)

11. “Xentury’s par­ent com­pany Xenel Corp., of Jed­dah, Saudi Ara­bia, is a hold­ing com­pany for some of the busi­nesses of the Alireza fam­ily, which has inter­ests rang­ing from petro­leum and telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions to ship­ping and real estate. The Alirezas’ expe­ri­ence in Florida could por­tend the tougher times ahead for Mid­dle East­ern busi­ness inter­ests in the U.S. as the Sept. 11 back­lash con­tin­ues to rever­ber­ate.” (Idem.)

12. Fur­ther detail­ing the rela­tion­ship between the Alireza busi­ness inter­ests, the DMI and the Al Shamal Bank, the pro­gram con­tin­ues: “In the case of Xen­tury City project, the furor arose with rev­e­la­tions that Abdul­lah Alireza is a direc­tor in Dar Al-Maal Al Islami Trust, or DMI Trust, of Saudi Ara­bia, which through a sub­sidiary held an inter­est in Al Shamal Bank of Sudan. U.S. State depart­ment offi­cials have alleged Osama bin Laden has used the Sudanese bank to fun­nel funds to ter­ror­ist causes. Fam­i­lies of the vic­tims of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks have put the DMI Trust on their list of defen­dants in a trillion-dollar law­suit seek­ing dam­ages from those alleged to have helped the ter­ror­ists. A lawyer for the vic­tims’ fam­i­lies says he wants to depose Mr. Alireza as part of dis­cov­ery in this law­suit, though he isn’t a defen­dant. In a let­ter to county com­mis­sion­ers, the lawyers sug­gested that should the law­suits suc­ceed, he would go after any assets of any defen­dants. That raised fears among county offi­cials that they could end up shar­ing lia­bil­ity should any ter­ror alle­ga­tions be proved . . .” (Idem.)

13. Gov­er­nor Jeb Bush and the White House inter­ceded on behalf of the Alireza fam­ily and Xen­tury City. It is worth not­ing that the time frame in which the mes­sage from the White House and Jeb Bush was deliv­ered to the county com­mis­sion­ers is the same time frame in which the sequence of events lead­ing up to Paul O’Neill’s res­ig­na­tion took place. “At a packed meet­ing late Mon­day in Kissimme, com­mis­sion­ers lis­tened to impas­sioned pleas from oppo­nents, replete with patri­otic ref­er­ences to Septmeber11. and the vic­tims of the ter­ror­ist attack. Paul Owen, the county com­mis­sion chair­man, says he received a call in recent days from the office of Florida Gov. Jeb Bush with a mes­sage from the gov­er­nor and the White House ask­ing com­mis­sion mem­bers to dis­miss geopo­lit­i­cal con­cerns from the their debate. [Empha­sis added.] But the Sep­tem­ber 11 issue couldn’t be ignored.” (Idem.)

14. Tying the DMI and Al Shamal bank to the con­tro­versy sur­round­ing a Saudi Princess’s chan­nel­ing of funds to a man con­nected to the Sep­tem­ber 11 hijack­ers, a recent arti­cle by the remark­able Lucy Komisar fur­ther delin­eated the links of the Saudi elite to the Al Qaeda milieu. “. . . The links between [Saudi ambassador’s wife Haifa] bin Faisal’s pow­er­ful Saudi fam­ily and the financ­ing of ter­ror­ism are even more exten­sive, how­ever. The trails of both Omar al-Bayoumi, the man who aided the hijack­ers, and that of the finan­cial net­work of bint Faisal’s fam­ily each led to Osama bin Laden. Accord­ing to a 1996 U.S. State Depart­ment report, al-Shamal Islamic Bank in Khar­toum (Sudan) was cap­i­tal­ized by bin Laden and wealthy mem­bers of Sudan’s National Islamic Front. Bin Laden invested mil­lions in the bank. Mohammed al-Faisal, bin Faisal’s brother, is an investor and board mem­ber at Al Shamal.” (“Fund­ing Ter­ror: Inves­ti­gat­ing the Role of Saudi Banks” by Lucy Komisar; In These Times; 12/20/2002; p. 2 of 3.)

15. “Al Shamal appears to have been a bin Laden bank of choice. Al-Qaeda mem­bers had accounts in Al Shamal, accord­ing to tes­ti­mony dur­ing U.S. tri­als sur­round­ing the 1998 attacks on Amer­i­can embassies in Kenya and Tan­za­nia. One Al-Qaeda col­lab­o­ra­tor, Essam al-Ridi, recounted how bin Laden trans­ferred $230 mil­lion from Al-Shamal to a bank in Ari­zona to buy a plane to fly Stinger mis­siles from Pak­istan to Sudan.” (Idem.)

16. “One of the bank’s three found­ing mem­bers and major share­hold­ers is Saleh Abdul­lah Kamel. A major finan­cial and media power in the Arab world, he is, in addi­tion, the chair­man of the Dal­lah al-Baraka (DBG). Al-Bayoumi was assis­tant to the Direc­tor of Finance for Dal­lah Avco, a DBG com­pany that worked with the Saudi avi­a­tion author­ity. The Wall Street Jour­nal has reported that the United States believed Dal­lah al-Baraka Bank, another DBG com­pany, was also used by al-Qaeda.” (Idem.)

17. The afore­men­tioned Bush busi­ness asso­ciate Khalid bin Mah­fouz is con­nected to Moham­mad Al-Faisal and the milieu described here. “Mohammed Al-Faisal is pres­i­dent of Dar al-Mal-Islami (DMI), the House of Finance of Islam. The Geneva-based bank is charged with dis­trib­ut­ing sub­si­dies of the royal fam­ily in the Mus­lim world. DMI, founded in 1981 and with assets of an esti­mated $3.5 bil­lion, also has con­nec­tions to the bin Laden fam­ily. Its 12-member board of direc­tors includes Hayda Mohamed bin Laden, Osama bin Laden’s half-brother and Khalid bin Mah­fouz, whose sis­ter Kaleda is one of Osama bin Laden’s wives. (bin Mah­fouz was indicted by the United States in the noto­ri­ous BCCI bank­ing scan­dal, which defrauded depos­i­tors of bil­lions, and in 1995 paid a $225-million fine.)” (Idem.)

18. In addi­tion, the DMI/Al-Shamal milieu is con­nected to the milieu of Al Taqwa. “DMI and Al-Shamal are not the only banks that link al-Faisal to Osama bin Laden. Al-Faisal’s DMI is a major share­holder of Al Taqwa, the bank reg­is­tered in the Bahamas and based in Switzer­land that was closed down last Novem­ber after Wash­ing­ton black­listed it as a cen­ter­piece of bin Laden’s finan­cial net­work. The United States has not, how­ever, black­listed Al-Shamal.” (Ibid.; pp. 2–3.)

19. A fas­ci­nat­ing devel­op­ment con­cerns a recent state­ment by Prince Naif, the Saudi inte­rior min­is­ter recently named as a defen­dant in a trillion-dollar law­suit by sur­vivors of vic­tims of the 9/11 attacks. Naif claimed that the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood was try­ing to desta­bi­lize Saudi Ara­bia and that mem­bers of the orga­ni­za­tion had recently been deported. Join­ing theo­cratic Islamic total­i­tar­i­an­ism with the cor­po­ratist eco­nomic phi­los­o­phy of Mus­solini, the Broth­er­hood was allied with the Axis pow­ers in World War II and is the par­ent orga­ni­za­tion of Al Taqwa, and closely con­nected to bin Laden. The Mus­lim Broth­er­hood has been heav­ily sub­si­dized by Saudi Ara­bia in the past. “Saudi Ara­bia has deported sev­eral mem­bers of the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood which is try­ing to desta­bi­lize the King­dom, Inte­rior Min­is­ter Prince Naif said in an inter­view pub­lished yes­ter­day. Prince Naif told Arab Times that the group has been work­ing to under­mine the Saudi lead­er­ship. ‘They have politi­cized Islam to serve their motives and many of them exploited Islam as a cover to desta­bi­lize and dis­in­te­grate the nation,’ he told the Kuwait-based daily. ‘Saudi Ara­bia recently deported some move­ment mem­bers to their coun­tries after they tried to harm the King­dom, both secretly and openly,’ Prince Naif said.” (“ ‘Broth­er­hood is try­ing to desta­bi­lize’ Saudi Ara­bia”; Arab News; 12/19/2002.)

20. The pos­si­bil­ity that the Saudis may be engag­ing in “mod­i­fied lim­ited hang­out” in order to deflect atten­tion from their role in the 9/11 attacks is not one to be too read­ily dis­missed. “It was the sec­ond time in sev­eral weeks that Prince Naif has lashed out against the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood, which has branches across the Islamic world and advo­cates the cre­ation of an Islamic state through peace­ful means. He said last month: ‘All out prob­lems come from the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood. We have given too much sup­port to this group . . . The Mus­lim Broth­er­hood has destroyed the Arab world.’” (Idem.)