Palestine Economy Portal | Exclusive

Translated by Tamara Barakat

Mohammad Mustafa Alami was born in Jerusalem in 1945. He studied at and graduated from St George’s School in Jerusalem. He was very passionate about education, and traveled to Britain and joined a paramilitary school. He was later accepted into the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, from which he obtained a PhD in Chemical Engineering in 1975.

Post graduation, Alami worked as a planning engineer at a petroleum company in Abu Dhabi. He was responsible for following up on and planning for the production of petroleum on the long-term. However, his work abroad lasted for only five years, as his family asked him to return to Palestine and work at the Jerusalem Cigarette Company.

He began working at the Jerusalem Cigarette Company in 1980, and started developing it and its production equipment in order to enhance its quality of production. For tens of years, the company contributed with more than $120 million annually to the Palestinian Treasury in taxes.

However, the sales of the company began to decline during the past few years. Alami attributes this decline to the economic policies that led to exacerbating tax evasion in the market, which in itself caused the decline of the company’s sales. Moreover, the current political conditions prevent the company from selling its products in Gaza. Consequently, the company’s contribution to the Treasury plummeted to less than $45 million annually.

Since the Jerusalem Cigarette Company enjoys a great level of autonomy, it did not seek the help of any other party lest it loses its independence. The company started to initiate new projects including establishing the Arab Care Medical Services Company and the Arab Investors Company. It also played a role in the establishment of PADICO Holding and its various subsidiaries, and invested through the Arab Investors Company in the real estate sector and land trade. It also tried to sell its products in Jerusalem despite the difficulty to do so.

Alami explains that all of these activities led to achieving a modest amount of success due to the taxes, fees, and bureaucracy that hinder investment. Still, he affirmed that the Jerusalem Cigarette Company will continue its work and investment in Palestine in order to achieve development and limit the dependence on foreign aid.

On another note, one of Alami’s greatest passions is writing about Jerusalem and history. Amid the large number of resources that tell true and false narratives about the past, Alami says that he writes whatever he believes and not what others want him to believe.

He publishes weekly articles in Al Quds Newspaper, most of which are on Jerusalem. He affirms that he will never stop writing since of his goals is to educate the common person since he/she is the foundation of society.

Alami is married and has two sons and two daughters, one of whom is Rawia Alami, a television presenter at Al-Arabiya news channel.