Woman Claiming to be Hassan II’s Daughter Pursues Legal Recognition with High-Profile Lawyer

The Belgian-Israeli Jane Benzaquen, 70, has hired Belgian lawyer Marc Uyttendaele to advance the legal proceedings. Thanks to this lawyer, Belgian plastic artist Delphine Boël won her long legal battle for paternity recognition. The former King of the Belgians, Albert II, admitted to being her biological father following a DNA test. Uyttendaele thus assigns himself the same mission so that Benzaquen, born in Casablanca on November 14, 1953, to Anita Benzaquen and Raoul Jossart, both now deceased, is recognized as a member of the Moroccan royal family. DNA tests had already proven that Raoul Jossart, the Belgian national designated as her father on her birth certificate, was not her biological father. Three other separate DNA tests have also proven that she has no ancestors from Western Europe and that her genetic heritage comes rather from North Africa and the Middle East.

According to the septuagenarian Benzaquen, her own grandmother, who left Morocco to settle in Belgium, told her that the heir apparent at the time, Moulay Hassan, would come to their family home in Casablanca in a royal Mercedes to drop off money and food. She also claimed that the royal cars would take her mother to secret rendezvous with the prince. In other words, there was a liaison between Hassan II and her mother. Information that comforts Benzaquen in her fight. She claims that before the death of Hassan II, 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," she told the newspaper The Times.

But the death of the sovereign in July 1999 sparked in her the desire to discover the truth. "Until then, I didn’t resemble any member of my family, now it’s the case, I’m happy. It was a revelation for me," she said. The former Tsahal soldier and former receptionist at a hotel in Eilat had, in June 2022, seized the Belgian justice system to demand that DNA tests be carried out on the five children of the late Hassan II. In response to this action, Morocco filed a complaint for "fraud" with a Brussels investigating judge against her and the Belgian members of her family.