Late Mohamed Al-Fayed: 3 Things To Know About The Egyptian Billionaire

Egyptian billionaire Mohamed Al-Fayed who died on Friday, 1st of September, 2023 has been buried following a service at Regent’s Park Mosque in London.

Announcing the death in a statement, A family member, Ashraf Haider wrote: “My wife’s grandfather, the Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed, has died. We belong to God and Him we shall return.”

The Egyptian billionaire is the former owner of Harrods department store, Fulham football club, and the father of Dodi Fayed, who died with Princess Diana in a car crash in 1997.

He made his fortune in the UK

Mohamed Al-Fayed was born in Alexandria, Egypt, in 1929. He moved to the United Kingdom in the mid-1960s and made his fortune in business.

He married Samira Khashoggi in 1954 and they had a son, Emad, known as Dodi. The couple divorced in 1956.

How Mohammed Al-Fayed made his fortune

Al-Fayed is best known for his ownership of Harrods, which he bought in 1985 and sold to Qatar in 2010 for $2.4bn.

He also owned the Ritz Paris Hotel and Fulham Football Club. Al Fayed reportedly sold Fulham Football Club to US auto parts billionaire Shahid Khan for a reported $300m in 2013.

Al-Fayed’s Son and Princess Diana

His eldest son, Dodi, was friends with the royal for about a decade before they got into a romantic relationship during a yacht holiday in the south of France.

However, they were denied the opportunity to spend their lives together, dying side-by-side in a car crash in Paris.

Reports say Al-Fayed was a vocal critic of the British royal family. He believed that they were involved in the deaths of his son Dodi and Princess Diana in the 1997 car crash.

Mohamed Al-Fayed also said that the couple was killed intentionally “because they still don’t accept that Dodi, my son, an Egyptian, a Muslim, can be the stepfather of the future king.”