Mohamed hadid/Instagram
Mohamed Hadid is showering his daughter with a lot of love!
The 73-year-old real estate developer paid tribute to daughter Gigi Hadid via Instagram in honor of her 27th birthday on Saturday.
“Guess what day is today,” Mohamed began the caption of his post, sharing a throwback photo of himself and the supermodel, whose head is popping out of his jacket, as a child.
The proud dad then went on to describe Gigi as “self made hardworking smart” and someone who “loves [and] respect[s] all people from all Religious walks of life.”
“She put[s] a smile on everyone,” he continued, in part. “She is after all A Hadid.”
Astrid Stawiarz/Getty for Meesika
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Mohamed shares Gigi with his ex-wife, Real Housewives of Beverly Hills alum Yolanda Hadid. Together the pair are also parents to daughter Bella and son Anwar.
Last year, Mohamed reiterated that his daughter is “self made” when he celebrated her 26th birthday. At the time, he said she “never took a single Dollar from her parents.”
Sharing a gallery of photos featuring Gigi and her then 7-month-old daughter Khai, Mohamed added that Gigi “started modeling for Baby Guess” when she was Khai’s age and studied forensic criminal psychology after high school.
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Mohamed’s comment about being “self-made,” however, prompted some backlash from online critics who questioned whether the term could apply to the supermodel given her privileged background.
Back in February 2019, Gigi opened up to ELLE about her frustrations with her success being solely tied to her parents’ connections.
“I mean, I understand it. I come from privilege, and I recognize my privilege,” she said at the time. “But because my mom was on a TV show, people think that my whole childhood was fame. It absolutely was not. My mom was a model. She moved to the States when she was 16 to send money back to her family in Holland. My dad was a refugee and worked his way up in every way. I work hard to honor my parents.”
Mohamed opened up to the U.K.’s Sunday Times in September 2020 about family life, saying that people “don’t look at me as Mohamed Hadid; they look at me as the father of Gigi and Bella and Anwar and Alana and Marielle.”
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“It’s dangerous for me to be their father. I have to be very careful. Everything I do is a reflection on them,” he added. “… Just being their father is a tremendous burden on me. They were my kids. Now I’m their father. It is what it is.”
Mohamed also told the outlet that his family is “much more private than people tend to think,” saying, “We are not the Kardashians.”
“We know the Kardashians as friends. Kendall is a great friend of my daughters and we have a lot of respect for what they do, and how they did it,” he said. “They are good people and they created something so unusual that you have to commend them. But I don’t use my kids to enhance my career. I protect them. I watch over them. I don’t want to take them out on the street and take pictures with them. Would we ever do a show? No, I don’t think that will happen.”
