Yaacov Meridor

Yaacov Meridor was a long-time friend of Menachem Begin, who served as a minister without portfolio in Begin's government. He was involved in various businesses with South Africa through Transkei, raking in commissions from countries that sought to bypass the boycott on South Africa by dealing through Transkei. Everything had to go through Meridor or a company he owned, including Degem, which was actually controlled by Israel's military intelligence and provided computer services to the South Africans and to Guatemala.¹

Meridor became embroiled in a scandal when he, along with Joe Peeples and a Romanian expatriate, attempted to sell a theoretically feasible but practically impossible solar energy system to the Hunt brothers of Texas for $2 million. He also sought a huge loan from the Israeli Treasury for this project, publicly announcing it on TV. However, a scientist from the Weizmann Institute exposed the scheme as a fraud, leading to Meridor losing his job as a cabinet minister and his credibility. His Transkei operations were also affected, which opened the door for Robert Maxwell to take over Degem.¹