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Kushner, diplomacy for Trump... billions for himself
Monday, September 29, marked a major financial victory for Jared Kushner. At 44, the son-in-law of Donald Trump and husband of Ivanka Trump, he became the center of world news after the giant purchase of the American video game company Electronic Arts, worth $ 55 billion. The deal was carried out through his firm Affinity Partners, in collaboration with the American investor Silver Lake and the Sovereign Wealth Fund of Saudi Arabia (SWF).
“ Jared Kushner’s art of the deal, ” wrote the Financial Times, while The Wall Street Journal described him as the “key man” in the largest private buyout in history, a move that paves the way for massive Saudi investment in the US.
But in addition to the financial success, this day also marked the political comeback of the man who had been the architect of the Abraham Accords (2020) between Israel and Arab countries such as the Emirates, Bahrain and later Morocco and Sudan. Kushner was at the White House press conference, where Trump presented the plan to end the war in Gaza, alongside Benjamin Netanyahu. The day before, he had met with the Israeli prime minister in New York, and then traveled to Egypt to negotiate the release of Hamas hostages.
Kushner's two lives: Riyadh diplomacy and billions in investments
Kushner, who today has a fortune that Forbes estimates at around $1 billion, continues to expand financial relations with Saudi Arabia, while in parallel returning to diplomatic missions in the Middle East, on behalf of his father-in-law.
But many analysts speak of an unprecedented conflict of interest. Saudi Arabia is seeking to invest massively in the US, while Washington needs Saudi approval and billions for the reconstruction of Gaza.
According to Kushner himself, " the waterfront properties in Gaza could be of extraordinary value ," a statement that has sparked fierce reactions. White House spokeswoman Caroline Leavitt called these accusations "disgusting," claiming that "Jared is serving world peace."
"The Saudis pay Trump's son-in-law tens of millions a year"
The criticism has been coming for a long time. As an adviser to Trump in 2017, Kushner helped to build rapprochement with Riyadh, even personally negotiating with Lockheed Martin to reduce the price of a more than $100 billion arms deal. Just six months after leaving the White House, his firm Affinity Partners received $2 billion from the Saudi PIF fund, even though the evaluation committee had opposed the investment due to a lack of experience. The decision was approved directly by Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
In September 2024, Democratic Senator Ron Wyden opened a formal investigation, revealing that PIF was paying Kushner’s company about $87 million in management fees. He warned that the Saudi funds were “being used to funnel money from a foreign government to the Trump family.”
From diplomacy to the video game business
In the deal to buy Electronic Arts, Kushner played a central role. He worked for a year with Silver Lake’s Egon Durban and convinced Riyadh to become a co-investor. The move takes Affinity Partners to another global level – with investments now including the Emirates, Qatar, Israel and Germany.
For the Saudi prince, technology and artificial intelligence are strategic areas. Saudi Arabia has already created a $38 billion entity to invest in video games and owns 10% of Electronic Arts itself.
From Harvard to Jerusalem
Kushner, a graduate of Harvard and NYU, is the son of businessman Charles Kushner, convicted of tax fraud in 2005 and pardoned by Trump himself in 2020. Raised in an Orthodox Jewish family, he married Ivanka in 2009.
In recent interviews, he admitted that he “got the job on the Middle East almost by accident.” But this “coincidence” brought the Abraham Accords and billions of dollars in investments that positioned him as the man who combines diplomacy with economic interest.
Kushner, Middle East and Balkans
Today he promotes cooperation between Israeli technology and Gulf capital, declaring that “business can bring peace faster than diplomacy.” His investment in the Israeli company Phoenix Holdings (with $170 billion under management) is seen as part of the same economic network that is uniting Israel with Arab countries.
But reports revealed that Phoenix has stakes in companies operating in illegal settlements in the West Bank, which again puts Kushner at the center of the ethical debate.
As happened in Albania and Serbia, where he has invested in large construction projects, Kushner justifies his presence with the argument that he is "investing in neglected regions that are becoming the new wave of growth."
In the case of the Balkans, his investments have been viewed with increased caution by Brussels, as they combine capital from the Middle East with strategic projects in a geopolitically sensitive area. In this context, Albania and Serbia have become new terrains for Kushner to test his model of combining politics, wealth and international influence, a formula that could change the future economic balances in the region. /Adapted from “Pamphlet” by “ Le Monde ”
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