Defeated Tunisian presidential candidate paid ex-Israeli intelligence official $250,000
Lobbyist Ari Ben-Menashe reported being paid $250,000 by Nabil Karoui's wife and a friend.
Canada-based lobbyist and ex-Mossad agent Ari Ben-Menashe reports being paid $250,000 to advocate for defeated Tunisian presidential candidate Nabil Karoui — even though Karoui has denied ever hiring him.
Karoui’s $1 million contract with Ben-Menashe’s Dickens & Madson upended the Tunisian presidential race after Al-Monitor first reported on the firm’s lobbying filing with the US Department of Justice in October. Now new filings indicate that Ben-Menashe was paid $250,000 the month before via two intermediaries: Karoui’s wife, Salwa Smaoui, and Salim Hamdadou, whom Ben-Menashe identified as a friend of Karoui’s.
The reported payments were made soon after the first round of the Tunisian elections, which saw Karoui advance to the second round along with eventual victor Kais Saied. Ben-Menashe told Al-Monitor that Smaoui and Hamdadou paid him because Karoui was in jail at the time on money laundering charges unrelated to his lobbying.
Four days before his Aug. 23 arrest, Karoui hired Ben-Menashe to help arrange meetings with US officials and boost his profile ahead of the elections, according to the initial lobbying contract filed with US authorities. The contract was signed by one Mohamed Bouderbala, whom Karoui has denied knowing as he sought to distance himself from Ben-Menashe and Dickens & Madson amid an uproar in Tunisia. Karoui did not respond to a call to his media firm in Tunis.
