An AI-generated ad showed Iraqi poet serving tea to politicians. Its creator received death threats

An AI-generated promotional video has sparked anger across Iraq after depicting the country's most celebrated poet, Muhammad Mahdi al-Jawahiri, serving tea to outgoing Prime Minister Muhammad Shia' al-Sudani. A second clip shows former royal-era Prime Minister Nuri al-Said performing the same act before Taqaddum party leader Muhammad al-Halbousi.

Produced by advertising firm Pana Marketing under the banner "United Iraq," the videos spread rapidly across social media in early February, drawing official condemnation, a government-ordered investigation, and death threats against the creator.

Al-Jawahiri (1899–1997), born in Najaf, is widely regarded as the greatest Arab poet of the modern era. He earned the title "the Third River" alongside the Tigris and Euphrates, worked in the royal court following the coronation of King Faisal I, before moving into education, won numerous Arab and international prizes, and was elected president of the Iraqi Union of Writers and Authors. His poem "Ya Dijlat al-Khayr" remains among the most celebrated in the Arabic canon.

Nuri al-Said (1888–1958), born in Baghdad, was one of the most prominent architects of the modern Iraqi state during the monarchy period. Placing both figures in a posture of service to contemporary politicians drew immediate condemnation from the highest official levels.

Government response

Prime Minister al-Sudani rejected the video's content, stating it was incompatible with the respect and appreciation he holds for al-Jawahiri's literary and national legacy.

He directed the Communications and Media Commission to open an urgent investigation into all parties who produced, promoted, or distributed the advertisement, citing its insult to cultural symbols and government institutions, as well as its irresponsible use of AI in violation of professional and media standards.

Al-Sudani reserved his legal right to prosecute the producing party for insulting Iraq and its national symbols.

Iraq's Ministry of Culture called the video "a stab at Iraq's memory," demanding deterrent measures against those responsible. Its statement read: "Al-Jawahiri was not a fleeting image to be consumed in digital frivolity, but a poetic conscience, a position, and a history that cannot be defiled by a fabricated video or by minds chasing fame in the mud."

The ministry added that what was done "is not a joke, nor content, it is a deliberate insult to a national symbol who carried the country's name and culture to Arab and international platforms with dignity."

Omar al-Sarrai, Secretary-General of the Iraqi Union of Writers and Authors, described the company's justification as "an excuse worse than the offence itself."

He invoked the Hammurabi Stele, which depicts the god Shamash seated in majesty while Hammurabi stands upright before him, as the model through which ancient Mesopotamians understood the transfer of national heritage.

"The video insulted everyone who appeared in it," al-Sarrai told The New Arab, "and stabbed a nation six thousand years old with a poisoned dagger that wants the homeland of civilisation to become the homeland of corporations." He called for qualified people with sound cultural judgment to oversee content that is "shattering the image of the homeland."

Ban Furat al-Jawahiri, the poet's granddaughter and a writer, focused on the video creator's claim that all parties approved the advertisement's details and allowed filming inside their offices.

"If she is truthful," al-Jawahiri said, "then she is presenting an explicit indictment of the government for approving it, and responsibility falls on both the government and the executing party."

The Nakhleh Centre for Press Rights and Freedoms condemned what it described as an attempt to manufacture "advertising shock for reach and marketing, empty of any meaning or significance," adding that the incident revealed "weakness in the concept and content."

The centre warned that AI tools are increasingly enabling "a broad base for vulgarity and decline across different media uses."

Death threats

The writer and director of the video, Ban al-Jumaili, defended the work. She told TNA, its message was "the unification of all sects and religions" and that her team used "the spirit of the poet, not his person, a symbolic return from past to present, an artistic and symbolic idea free of insult."

She told media outlets she had faced a campaign of harassment, defamation, and threats that escalated to death threats. She described the backlash as "a deliberate conversion of a social work into a political issue."

She addressed her critics directly, saying, "Watch the advertisement in full, step outside the political lens, and you will understand its meaning and purpose."

Political analyst Nathir al-Kandouri told TNA that he saw no evidence of deliberate political intent behind the video's production, but doubted it was published without the knowledge of al-Sudani and al-Halbousi.

He attributed the lapse to "a lack of cultural awareness and inexperience in using the country's historical symbols for personal promotion," explaining that al-Sudani's rejection of the video came only after he saw the scale of public anger, which, in turn, indicates that the decision to approve it was not fully considered.

Al-Kandouri placed the incident within a broader pattern of political provocations involving Iraq's historical symbols, citing past controversies over street names referencing al-Rashid and the removal of statues of Baghdad's founder, Abu Jafar al-Mansour. "Iraq's current politicians and their advisers are unfortunately not statesmen," he said.

"Despite the long period since the establishment of the current Iraqi system and their lengthy experience in political work, this has not translated into increased political competence. Every time, they fall into embarrassing pitfalls that diminish them before the Iraqi people," the analyst concluded.

This story was published in collaboration with Egab.