Raised in an allegedly religious Muslim household, Loay Al-Shareef is an Arab online activist who has been involved in Israel’s attempted cultural diplomacy approach in Arab Gulf states, spewing pro-Zionist narratives across his accounts and in his online “Arab language lessons”. This Saudi has been immersed in Zionism since the 2020 Abraham Accords between Israel, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Bahrain and has contacts with various known Israeli soft diplomacy operatives in the region.

Loay Ahmed Amin Al-Jaafari Al-Shareef was born on November 11, 1982 in Saudi Arabia from Egyptian ancestry and a family from Bahrain. Al-Shareef who once “didn’t have positive views about Israel,” claims to have changed views after spending time with a Jewish family in Paris.1 Loay moved to the United States and graduated with an M.A. in software engineering from Pennsylvania State University in 2013. He is fluent in 4 languages (Arabic, English, French, and Hebrew) and wishes to get an academic degree in Israel and study the history of the “Dead Sea Scrolls”. In 2018, he had an engagement to a non-Muslim American woman. Recently Bahraini citizenship was granted to him, facilitating his pro-Israel activities in post-Abraham Accords Bahrain.