The ex hotel receptionist who claims to be a Moroccan princess: Grandmother, 70, who is daughter of Jewish shop assistant goes to court in Belgium to get DNA test to prove late King Hassan II was her father
- Jane Benzaquen, 70, claims she is the daughter of King Hassan II of Morocco
- The Belgian-Israeli national is calling for Morocco’s Royals to submit DNA tests
A former hotel receptionist from Israel has launched legal proceedings in Belgium to prove she is the daughter of King Hassan II of Morocco.
Jane Benzaquen, 70, is calling on members of Morocco’s royal family to submit to DNA tests, in her fight to be recognised as the late King’s daughter.
The Belgian-Israeli national claims her Jewish mother had an affair with King Hassan after meeting him at the age of 17 while working as a shop assistant in Casablanca.
As a young child, Ms Benzaquen was subsequently whisked out of Morrocco and raised in Belgium by a foster family.
Now, Ms Benzaquen, who moved to Israel aged 18 to join the IDF, is fighting to prove she is a Moroccan princess.
Jane Benzaquen, 70, (pictured) has filed legal proceedings over claims King Hassan II of Morocco is her father
The 70-year-old grandmother claims King Hassan II (pictured) had an affair with her mother Freha Benzaquen between 1951 and 1953
She claims that prior to King Hassan’s death, she had refused to delve into her own past.
‘I was filled with anger, the past was a Pandora’s box and I didn’t want to open it,’ Ms Benzaquen told The Times.
The grandmother, however, claims news of King Hassan’s death in July 1999, sparked an urge within her to discover the truth.
‘Until then I didn’t look like anyone in my family, now I did, I was happy. It was a revelation for me,’ she said.
DNA tests had previously proved Raoul Jossart, the Belgian national named as her father on her birth certificate, was not in fact her biological father.
Three separate DNA tests also proved Ms Benzaquen has no Western European ancestry and that her genetics are instead rooted in north Africa and the Middle East.
Ms Benzaquen claims her own grandmother, who later moved to Belgium from Morocco, would tell her stories of the then Crown Prince Hassan visiting their family home in Casablanca in a Royal Mercedes to drop off money and food.
Jane Benzaquen is calling on members of King Hassan II’s (pictured) family to submit to DNA tests
She claimed the Royal cars would take Ms Benzaquen’s mother off for trysts with the prince, in what became a love affair between a young Jewish girl and the head of Morocco’s Muslim community.
In her fight for recognition, Ms Benzaquen has now recruited Belgian constitutional expert Marc Uyttendaele, to push ahead with legal proceedings.
Mr Uttendaele previously won a case that saw Princess Delphine of Belgium win recognition as a member of Belgium’s royal family
The case saw Belgian courts force King Albert II to submit to DNA tests that subsequently proved the Belgian monarch was her father.
In the case of Ms Benzaquen, King Hassan II is alleged to have had a relationship with the Belgian-Israeli national’s mother, Freha Benzaquen, between 1951 and 1953.
King Hassan was later reported to have fallen in love with French film actress Etchika Choureau between 1956 and 1961, before he was obliged to marry a Morroccan woman, Lalla Latif, in order to take the throne.
Mr Uyttendaele claims Mr Jossart, who is recorded as Ms Benzaquen’s father on her birth certificate, may have been hired King Hassan to stand in as cover.
The Belgian national’s wedding to Freha Benzaquen is claimed to have been a sham, with Mr Jossart, who died in 2001, having been in Sweden at the time of the ceremony.
During his reign, King Hassan II (pictured in Washington DC with John F. Kennedy) ruled Morocco with an iron fist
Prior to his death, King Hassan ruled Morocco with an iron fist, which subsequently saw him accused of carrying out human rights abuses.
During his 38 year reign, the King also survived two attempted coup d’états in the early 1970s.
Ms Benzaquen’s son, Eldad, 48, who lives near Tel Aviv, has championed his mother’s efforts to win recognition from Morocco’s royal family.
Morocco’s current monarch, King Mohammed VI, has, however, refused to submit DNA tests – despite Ms Benzaquen’s claims that she is his half-sister.
Stanislas Eskenazi, a lawyer representing Morocco’s Royal family, has instead filed a counter lawsuit against Ms Benzaquen, accusing her of extortion.
Morocco’s royals are famed for their riches, with King Mohammed VI being named by Forbes in 2015 as the richest monarch in Africa.
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