Do we like Amr Diab?
Our score: 5 out of 10. Little harm on the record but a thin file, and a court-fined slap and a silent ad keep him mid-table.
Amr Diab is one of the Arab world's biggest pop stars, a regular headliner at Gulf festivals. In a 2018 interview with Gulf News he said the UAE was one of his favourite countries. I couldn't open a full profile of his early years, so this column sticks to what I could read for myself.
The story he's most tied to lately is the wedding slap. In June 2024 a video went viral showing him slapping a fan who tried to take a selfie with him at a wedding party, and the fan's family said they would take legal action. Gulf News carried no statement from Diab in that report. In April 2026 Egypt's Court of Cassation rejected appeals from both sides and upheld a fine of 200 Egyptian pounds.
Then there's the 2021 Citroën ad. It showed him secretly photographing a woman through a rearview camera and then inviting her into the car. Activist Reem Abdellatif called it “creepy” and critics accused it of enabling sexual harassment. Citroën pulled the ad and apologised; SBS reported no apology from Diab, who had posted the ad on his own accounts.
On the harm test, the file is thin. Searches turned up nothing from him on LGBTQ+ people, trans people, vaccines, climate or migrants, so there are no harmful words to point at. The one mark against him is that ad, which came from a brand campaign rather than his own speeches, and his silence afterwards.
The recent moment is smaller but fits the pattern people grumble about. At a wedding in April 2026 he reportedly interrupted Yousra mid-speech, took the microphone and carried on with his set. It went viral, and filmmaker Amir Ramsis added a sarcastic post. Misr Connect quotes nothing from Diab himself, so it's a clip that says more about stage manners than anything serious.
The good stuff is where I came up short. Reports mention donations for Gaza relief and charity campaigns, but I couldn't open a page to confirm the details, so I'm not counting them. Fair enough to say we don't know enough to hand him a gold star.