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President-elect Donald Trump has tapped his daughter’s father-in-law Massad Boulos as a senior adviser on the Middle East, thrusting the Lebanese auto tycoon into the fragile effort to uphold a US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hizbollah in Lebanon.
Trump said Boulos would be senior adviser to the president on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs, joining real estate developer Steve Witkoff, who he named special envoy to the region, and his nominee for US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee.
None have traditional diplomatic backgrounds and reflect Trump’s penchant for elevating close friends and family to key positions.
“Massad is a dealmaker, and an unwavering supporter of PEACE in the Middle East. He will be a strong advocate for the United States, and its interests, and I am pleased to have him on our team!” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Boulos, whose son Michael is married to Trump’s youngest daughter Tiffany, spent most of the past year drumming up support for Trump among Arab Americans in the battleground state of Michigan.
Boulos recently travelled to Washington to meet senior Lebanese officials and other diplomats and US representatives.
It was widely assumed he would be the next person to oversee relations between Israel and Lebanon, taking up the file from President Joe Biden’s senior adviser Amos Hochstein.
Hochstein has briefed several people close to Trump on the ceasefire effort but not Boulos, a person familiar with the matter said. Hochstein has been in touch with Witkoff, Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz and Jared Kushner, the person said.
Born into a Christian family in Kfar Akka, Lebanon, he moved to Texas as a teenager to attend the University of Houston. After graduation, Boulos joined his family’s automotive business in Nigeria, rising to lead Scoa Motors and Boulos Enterprises, which dominate the Nigerian market for motorcycles and vehicles.
He is known to have close ties across Lebanon’s Christian political class, including with Suleiman Frangieh, a leading Christian politician and Hizbollah’s preferred candidate to fill the vacant presidency.
The US last week announced that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to a ceasefire, ending more than a year of fighting between Israel and Hizbollah.
The US-brokered ceasefire deal outlines a gradual withdrawal of Israeli and Hizbollah forces from southern Lebanon over the course of 60 days. The Lebanese army and Unifil troops are set to deploy widely in the region, which will be enforced by a US-led monitoring mechanism.
Trump has now chosen two of his daughters’ fathers-in-law for government positions, after announcing that Charles Kushner would be US ambassador to France. Kushner is the father of Jared Kushner, who is married to Trump’s eldest daughter Ivanka.
Jared Kushner held several prominent posts in Trump’s first administration, particularly related to the Middle East, with Ivanka also serving as a senior adviser. Neither are expected to take official roles this time around.
Jared Kushner and Trump’s son Donald Jr are also key transition advisers.
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