Haifa bint Faisal

Haifa bint Faisal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, also called Haifa Al Faisal, (Arabic: هيفاء بنت فيصل‎‎) (born 1950) is a member of the House of Saud.

Haifa bint Faisal was born in 1950. She is the daughter of King Faisal and Queen Iffat. She is the full sister of Mohammed bin Faisal, Saud bin Faisal, Luluwah bint Faisal Sara bint Faisal and Turki bin Faisal.

After the September 11 attacks, she was investigated for a sequence of payments allegedly made to a Saudi national by the name of Omar al-Bayoumi, who is known to have assisted two of the hijackers upon their arrival in Southern California, and who himself is suspected of being a Saudi intelligence asset. Investigation has confirmed that some of the payments were in fact forwarded to al-Bayoumi's wife, Manal Bajadr; the significance of these payments (and the extent to which they may have assisted the hijackers) is unclear.

In April 1998, Osama Basnan, a Saudi national living in California, wrote to Haifa requesting money for his wife's needed thyroid surgery. Haifa sent Basnan $15,000, although his wife, Majeda Dweikat, was not actually treated for another two years.

At some later point (accounts vary as to when; dates between November 1999 and March 2000 were given, and a Saudi government official put the onset at 4 December 1999), Haifa began sending monthly cashier's checks to Dweikat of either $2,000 or $3,500, transporting them through Riggs Bank. Dweikat signed some of these checks over to her friend Manal Bajadr, wife of Omar al-Bayoumi. The payments continued through May, 2002 and eventually totaled as much as $73,000. (This sort of charitable donation known as Zakat from members of the House of Saud to Saudi nationals living abroad is not particularly unusual.)

Osama Basnan had been under suspicion for many years. In 1992, the FBI had received information suggesting a connection between him and a terror group later associated with Osama bin Laden. In 1993, there were reports that Basnan hosted a party for Shaikh Omar Abdul-Rahman. According to an anonymous U.S. official, Basnan "celebrated the heroes of September 11" shortly after the attacks, and talked about "what a wonderful, glorious day it had been." In interviews and investigations after the attack, Basnan has given sharply contradictory testimony about monies received and his relationship with Bajadr and al-Bayoumi. Basnan was deported on 17 November 2002.

Omar al-Bayoumi was the husband of Manal Bajadr, who received some of the monies from Dweikat. Al-Bayoumi had several intriguing connections to two of the hijackers: Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. He met them in a restaurant soon after the two had first arrived in Los Angeles, and convinced them to move to San Diego. He picked out an apartment for them, co-signed the lease, and loaned them $1,500 to pay their rent.

Al-Bayoumi then moved in across the street from them and assisted them in other not-so minor ways: he helped open a bank account, obtain car insurance, get Social Security cards and call flight schools in Florida—and also threw a welcoming party for the hijackers, during which he introduced them to the local Muslim community.

Some of al-Bayoumi's other activities—for example, his habit of videotaping commercial and governmental facilities in the San Diego area—were conspicuous enough to give rise to rumors that he was a Saudi agent.

Once this story became known, it was thoroughly investigated. (Some of these investigations led to the Riggs Bank scandals of 2003 and 2004.) Although there are still many questions about al-Bayoumi and Basnan, the 9/11 Commission Report asserts, in footnote 122, that the hijackers al-Midhar and al-Hazmi did not receive any funding from them: "We have found no evidence that Saudi Princess Haifa al Faisal provided any funds to the conspiracy, either directly or indirectly.". (The quote itself comes either from David D. Aufhauser of the U.S. Treasury Department, or Adam B. Drucker, of the FBI.)

The Report does not provide further detail, or primary source material that would substantiate its claim that the Faisal-Bayoumi transfers did not "directly or indirectly" assist the hijackers; it simply rests on the fact that the burden of proof for any argument that the transfers did assist the hijackers has not been met by available evidence.

Her and her family's reaction

According to the Saudi daily, Al Riyadh, Haifa became ‘so terrified’ that she asked that all checks drawn against her bank account with the Riggs Bank in Washington DC since 1994 be examined. In 2002, in regard to the accusations against her Prince Turki, her brother, stated "Any allegations about money from my sister reaching the hijackers is allegation and half-truths and totally untrue."

Haifa is the spouse of Bandar bin Sultan. They have eight children, four daughters and four sons.

Haifa told that when she saw Bandar first, she had a feeling she would marry him. After four years, in 1972 they married. She said that their marriage was not a pre-arranged one. Her mother, Iffat, was a friend of Bandar's grandmother, Hassa. She further said that her mother also liked Bandar.

Haifa is chairperson of Zahra Breast Cancer Association and a board member of Effat University.