February 14, 2025
Prince Karim Al-Hussaini, Aga Khan IV, hereditary Imam of the world’s 12-15 million Shia Ismaili Muslims, died recently in Lisbon, Portugal. What a life he led.
The Aga Khan (Great Khan as he was universally known) was born in Geneva, Switzerland and spent much of his flamboyant life jet-setting around Europe and North America. His charming, much younger sister, Princess Yasmin, attended the International School in Geneva with me. The young Aga Khan went to the world’s most exclusive boys’ school up Lake Geneva, le Rosey. I didn’t want to go there because it was boys only – though many of them were princlings from the Arabian Gulf (still not changed yet to the ‘Trump Gulf’).
Karim’s ostensible religious mission was to aid and lead the scattered Ismaili community in Asia, North America, and Africa. But he spent much of his time racing fast cars, throwing opulent parties, and hobnobbing with movie stars and other gorgeous women. Not so strictly Islamic. In some ways, the Aga Khan resembled that other world-famous playboy and bon vivant, Fiat’s Gianni Agnelli.
I was on a Mediterranean sailing cruise with a bunch of Le Rosey graduates. Everyone called me ‘the spy’ from the International School, their traditional rival. I rudely called them a bunch of rich sissies. We sailed to the newish Sardinian harbor of Porto Cervo, recently built to resemble an ancient-looking fishing village worthy of Disney Studios. Prince Karim, a Rosey graduate, invited us to his home for lunch. The Aga Khan returned to his youth, as we all do when reunited with our schoolmates. He turned out to be a very charming man with a quick wit and sharp sense of humor. Even he called me, ‘the spy.’
Bon vivant though the was, Prince Karim was also a talented businessman and organizer. His sect would build hospitals, clinics, museums and homes for the elderly in Africa, Pakistan, Canada, Iran and southern Europe. Toronto was distinguished by an impressive Aga Khan Museum.
According to legend, the hereditary Khan was given his weight in gold each ear by his adoring supporters. No mention was made of his fondness for champagne, fashion models and Maserati’s. The Khan managed to effortlessly balance all with grace and charm. Riches, he would say, are a gift from Allah.
Later, I voyaged high up in Pakistan’s Karakoram Mountain Range to the remote Hunza Valley which had become home of the Ismaili sect. Hunza was wild and beautiful, lost among snow-capped peaks. It is said that the American author James Hilton used Hunza as his model for Shangri-la, the land where people never grew old or fell sick. There seemed to be a spirituality hanging over the valley.
What amazed me was that the Ismailis were an ancient sect dating back to the distant era of the Crusades. According to legend, the Ismailis were based in the mountain fortress of Alamut from whence their relentless killers, armed with poisoned daggers, terrorized the entire Mideast. The assassins were heavily drugged with super potent hashish and turned into killers.
For a century, most leaders in the Mideast – Christian or Muslim – paid them protection money and quivered in fear before them. However, today’s Ismailis are peaceful and enterprising. Their Aga Khan was one of the Mideast’s best, most productive leaders. There are high hopes for his successor, son Prince Rahim al-Hussaini
RIP Prince Karim.
Copyright Eric S. Margolis 2025
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