BIOGRAPHIC INFORMATION ON JAMAL AL-KHUDARI

C O N F I D E N T I A L JERUSALEM 004681 SIPDIS SIPDIS NEA FOR FRONT OFFICE; NEA/IPA FOR WILLIAMS/SHAMPAINE/STEINGER; NSC FOR ABRAMS/DORAN/WATERS E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/27/2016 TAGS: KBIO PGOV KWBG KPAL SUBJECT: BIOGRAPHIC INFORMATION ON JAMAL AL-KHUDARI REF: JERUSALEM 1175 Classified By: Consul General Jake Walles, Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d). ¶1. (C) Jamal al-Khudari, the current PA Minister of Telecommunication and Information Technology, has been mentioned in Palestinian circles as a potential Prime Minister in a new PA government. He was elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council in January 2006 as an independent from Gaza City with support from Hamas. ¶2. (C) Al-Khudari received a BA in electrical engineering in Egypt. He is a member of a Gaza engineering union and served as its chairman between 1990 and 1997. Until his election to the PLC, he had served on the board of trustees of the Islamic University in Gaza for 14 years. As a businessman active in trade, he served as a board member of Paltrade for two years. He is the brother of Jawdat Khoudary, a former Palestine Investment Fund (Fund) board member and the chairman of the Saqa and Khoudary Contracting Company which constructed the Gaza Power Plant. The al-Khudari family also has ties to the Athens-based Consolidated Contractors Company (CCC). Jamal al-Khudari does not have a financial interest in his brother's contracting company, according to Mohammed al-Khozendar, Chairman of the Khozendar Group, another Gaza-based contracting firm. ¶3. (C) As a PA minister, al-Khudari has stayed in Gaza. He has traveled widely in the region to fund raise, though we are not aware if he was successful. He played a key role in the recent award of the second cellular phone license in the West Bank/Gaza, though the Israeli government has not allotted frequency for this new operator. Al-Khudari submitted his resignation August 17 in order to allow for a national unity government to be formed but withdrew it September 4 after the PA Prime Minister refused to accept it. Several private sector contacts of the Consulate General told us that al-Khudari had wanted to leave the government for some time since he had not expected to be in a government that was not in contact with the international community. ¶4. (C) Comment: Given al-Khudari's strong ties to Hamas, he is a far less appealing choice than other names which are circulating, though he is technically an independent. End comment. WALLES