Confronting Telco Ad Featuring A Suicide Bomber Divides Middle East

Confronting Telco Ad Featuring A Suicide Bomber Divides Middle East

A new campaign for Kuwaiti telecommunications giant Zain featuring a suicide bomber and actual victims of terror attacks is dividing the Middle East with some calling it brave and others exploitative.

The ad eerily follows a suicide bomber who’s repeatedly met with a singing message of “Worship your God with love, not terror”.

Check out the ad below.

The video features Arabic pop star Hussain al-Jassmi and has registered over 2.5 million views on Zain’s YouTube page and more than almost 5000 shares on Facebook.

Fans of the ad have congratulated the telco for dealing with such a difficult issue, however, critics have said it “distorts the truth” and singles out the portrayal of the Syrian boy who made global headlines who was injured in a military attack and not a terrorism bombing.

A fan of the ad wrote on Facebook: “Finally, it’s about time Arab brands stepped up and deny terrorism and speak about what happening in the community instead of buying their head in the sands” and another added, “Islam has a clear violence problem and in order to solve a problem you first need to acknowledge that there is a problem. I know it’s not customary to talk about the less positive things within the Muslim/Arab world but this video is amazing.”




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