Samira Khashoggi

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Samira Khashoggi (or Kashoggi) (1935 - March 1986) was the daughter of Muhammad Khashoggi, a medical doctor who was Turkish by descent; the family name means spoonmaker in that language. She was the first wife of Egyptian born billionaire Mohamed Al-Fayed, whom she met on the beach in Alexandria[1], and younger sister of the notorious arms dealer, Adnan Khashoggi. The 1954 marriage lasted two years, and produced one child, Dodi Al-Fayed, who died in a car accident with Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997.

Samira separated from Mohamed Al-Fayed just months after Dodi's birth. She died of a heart attack in 1986 aged 51. Dodi was devoted to her, and would telephone her almost every day up to her death. Fayed once told a friend: "If it meant giving up everything I have - cars, wealth and women - I would do it to bring my mother back."[2] Samira's second husband died in a car crash as did Dodi's aunt.[3]

Samira Khashoggi wrote the first Saudi novel written by a woman in the early 1960s.[4] She was the aunt of actress Nabila Khashoggi, the daughter of her brother Adnan.[5]