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Amira Khalil

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  • 3 min read
  • TikTok is bringing new AI literacy tools to the Middle East and North Africa and trialing tougher spam detection.
  • The platform removed more than 86 million fake accounts in the first quarter of 2026 and labeled over 3 billion AI-generated videos.
  • New detection systems will first target politics, current events, financial advice, and medical information.
  • TikTok committed $4 million to AI literacy and responsible-use programs with partners including No Filtr and Raspberry Pi.

AI literacy in MENA by TikTok now sits at the center of how the platform plans to help people tell real content from synthetic. TikTok said this week it will bring new AI literacy tools to users in the Middle East and North Africa, alongside trials of tougher systems that flag synthetic spam. The move lands as platforms face rising pressure to police AI-generated content. In a statement, the company kept its aim simple. “As artificial intelligence continues to transform the way people create and discover content, TikTok is expanding its efforts to ensure users can confidently navigate AI-powered experiences,” it said.

What TikTok is rolling out

The updates fall into three parts. First come literacy resources built with outside experts, including a new AI literacy guide developed with the National Association for Media Literacy Education and AI specialist Henry Ajder. Second is stronger AI spam detection aimed at accounts that mass-produce synthetic posts. Third are wider partnerships meant to improve transparency across the industry. TikTok said it removed more than 86 million fake accounts in the first quarter of 2026. Beyond that, it labeled more than 3 billion AI-generated videos using Content Credentials, creator disclosure tools, and invisible watermarking.

AI literacy in MENA by TikTok, and who it reaches

Education sits at the heart of AI literacy in MENA by TikTok. The company said creators across the region increasingly use AI for storytelling, teaching, and creative work. To support that, TikTok pledged $4 million toward literacy and responsible-use programs, working with groups such as No Filtr and Raspberry Pi. The point is practical. People who can recognize a synthetic clip get to decide for themselves what to trust. That skill matters most for younger users, who spend the most time inside these feeds.

AI spam detection and the trust problem

Not every use of AI is harmless. TikTok said it will begin testing enhanced detection systems built to spot accounts dedicated to posting AI-generated spam. The first focus is content that can shape public trust or well-being, meaning politics and current events, financial advice, and medical information. Those areas carry the highest risk when false posts spread fast. Better AI spam detection, the company suggests, shields real creators whose work can get buried under machine-made noise. The rollout of AI literacy in MENA by TikTok pairs this enforcement with education. On the transparency side, TikTok joined the steering committee of the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity, a cross-industry effort on content provenance that helps people trace where a piece of media came from.

AI influencers and the disclosure question

The regional picture explains the urgency. According to GroupM’s 2026 analysis, the number of verified AI influencers on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube grew by more than 40 percent in 2025. That figure could reach about 15 percent of all influencer-marketing spend by the end of 2026. PwC Middle East reported in January 2026 that most Gen Z consumers in Riyadh and Dubai follow at least one AI influencer, with round-the-clock engagement named as a key driver. The message reads clearly for the region. Audiences here welcome AI-generated content, yet they still expect to be told when it is synthetic. That expectation is what AI literacy in MENA by TikTok is meant to serve.

TAGS
  • AI, MENA, Tech, TikTok

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Myriam Fares first concert in the Netherlands
  • Myriam Fares

Myriam Fares’ first concert in the Netherlands is scheduled for Friday, October 2, 2026, at Het Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. The Lebanese singer will share the stage with her full live band. SOUK Amsterdam Arabic Festival presents the show, and an afterparty follows the performance. This date is her Dutch debut after more than two decades on stage.

Who is Myriam Fares

Fares is known across the Arab world as The Queen of Stage. Her career began in 2003 and has spanned more than twenty years. Live shows blend Arabic musical traditions and instruments with modern pop, choreography and dance. She works as a singer, performer and songwriter, drawing on influences from several parts of the Arab world. Beyond music, she has also worked as an actress, producer and entrepreneur.

The venue sits at the center of the plan. Het Concertgebouw Amsterdam ranks among the city’s best-known concert halls, and it has hosted the SOUK festival in past years. This edition places Fares in the Main Hall with her own band. The concert brings the performer to Dutch audiences for the first time. Arabic pop, dance and live music fill the evening inside the historic building. Myriam Fares’ first concert in the Netherlands caps a run of high-profile appearances abroad.

Recent releases and tour dates

Fares performed during the Qatar Formula 1 Grand Prix. She reached a wider global audience with Tukoh Taka, the official FIFA Fan Festival anthem for the 2022 World Cup, recorded with Nicki Minaj and Maluma. Her track Goumi became a global dance hit, with millions of people joining its challenge on TikTok. A Netflix documentary, Myriam Fares: The Journey, gave viewers a closer look at her personal life and creative work. Recent Myriam Fares tour dates and stage shows have carried her across the region and further afield. In 2025, she released La Habibi. Her latest single, Ma Btaarefne, arrived in June 2026 through her own label, Myriam Music.

How to attend the concert in the Netherlands

Planning for the first concert in the Netherlands starts with the ticket date. Myriam Fares concert tickets go on sale on Friday, August 7, 2026. SOUK Amsterdam Arabic Festival organizes the event, so ticket details run through the festival and the venue. The Main Hall seating and the planned afterparty give attendees a full evening rather than a short set. For fans across Europe, Myriam Fares’ first concert in the Netherlands offers a rare chance to see the performer live in the region. The date falls on a Friday, which suits travel plans for visitors from nearby countries.

  • 3 min read
Al Balad Development Company
  • Saudi Arabia

The Al Balad Development Company’s partnership with Al Ittihad Club has moved to platinum sponsorship, a step that links a football club to the long effort to rebuild one of Saudi Arabia’s oldest urban districts. This Al Ittihad Club platinum sponsorship replaces the silver tier the two sides agreed in 2023. It shifts the relationship from media and marketing visibility toward a season-long program of activities connected to Historic Jeddah.

Al Balad Development Company, known as BDC, is wholly owned by the Public Investment Fund. It serves as the master developer of the Jeddah Historical District, the walled old town listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Al Ittihad Club, founded in Jeddah in 1927, is the oldest sports club in the country and carries a large regional following. Placing the two side by side puts heritage development next to one of the city’s most visible cultural assets.

What the agreement covers

Under the agreement, presented on their official website, both sides will draw on a range of media and marketing assets alongside community initiatives and events across the season. The activities will promote the cultural offerings of Historic Jeddah and BDC’s own projects. Shared content, supporter experiences, and district events form the core of the plan. The intent is to pull fans closer to the old town and to raise engagement with the district among younger residents.

Jamil Hassan Ghaznawi, CEO of Al Balad Development Company, said the partnership would help promote the company’s projects, attract visitors and investors, and support economic activity in the area. He noted the collaboration builds on the club’s long connection with Jeddah and its supporter base. The focus, he said, would fall on experiences that join sport, culture, and the historic district.

“We believe that reviving Historic Jeddah extends beyond urban regeneration to fostering sustainable connections between people and their environment. Partnering with Al Ittihad Club, backed by its massive fanbase is a pivotal step forward. It allows us to showcase our projects, attract visitors and investors, and drive regional economic activity.”, Jamil Hassan Ghaznawi said.

The Al Balad Development Company partnership and Vision 2030

The Al Balad Development Company partnership sits inside a wider structural shift. BDC works under the Public Investment Fund’s strategy and under Saudi Vision 2030, the plan to move the economy away from oil. Tourism, hospitality, and cultural sectors carry a defined role in that plan. A sponsorship that fills stadiums and feeds social channels becomes a route to an audience for a development brand that needs one.

Domingos Soares, CEO of Al Ittihad Club, said the club’s long relationship with Jeddah and its community gave the expanded partnership a firm base. He added the sponsorship would support work designed to bring supporters closer to the cultural and social life of the old district while adding value for fans and the city.

A club as a development tool

The reasoning is direct. BDC is developing roughly 2.5 million square meters of the historic core, with plans for homes, hotels, and commercial space, while keeping the district’s architectural character. A project on that scale needs footfall and attention. Al Ittihad supplies both.

The Al Balad Development Company partnership also shows how PIF-owned entities now work in concert. PIF holds a majority stake in Al Ittihad and full ownership of BDC. Sponsorship between the two keeps investment and messaging inside one portfolio. For the district, the return will show less in logo placement and more in whether the club’s supporters follow their team into Historic Jeddah’s streets, hotels, and cultural venues over the season ahead.

Photo Credit: The Al Balad Development Company

  • 3 min read
World Bank grants $100 million to Syria
  • Investments

The World Bank grants $100 million to Syria to rebuild the foundations of a financial system worn down by more than a decade of conflict. Delivered as a grant from the International Development Association, the Bank’s arm for its poorest borrowers, the money will fund the Syria Financial Sector Modernization Project. That program is built to make payments safer and to widen access to banking. Behind the headline figure sits a harder question about governance, one about who will oversee the funds and to what standard.

A sector rebuilt from cash upward

After 14 years of war, Syria’s banking system remains small and leans heavily on cash. Financial intermediation is thin, digital payment infrastructure is dated, and supervision has weakened. These gaps raise the cost of every transaction and keep the country cut off from the international channels that trade and investment depend on. The project aims to operationalize core financial systems and to enable at least 15 million electronic retail payments a year. It also aims to bring 500,000 people and businesses into digital payments, among them 150,000 women. Expanding Syria’s digital payments sits at the center of the plan, which the World Bank frames as a route toward wider financial inclusion.

Why the World Bank grants $100 million to Syria now

Timing reflects a shift in how Damascus and the Bank work together. In May 2025, Saudi Arabia and Qatar cleared Syria’s arrears to the International Development Association, which restored the country’s eligibility for financing after a 14-year suspension. A month later, the Bank approved a $146 million grant for emergency electricity, its first Syrian project in nearly four decades. Finance Minister Mohamed Yisr Barnieh has said the Bank endorsed Syria’s economic reform plans for 2026. The latest decision, in which the World Bank grants $100 million to Syria, carries that reengagement into the heart of the financial system.

Oversight, integrity, and accountability

Much of the grant targets control rather than cash. The plan funds independent asset quality reviews across public and private banks, a step meant to show regulators the true health of the system. It strengthens risk-based supervision and rebuilds the Central Bank of Syria’s core systems, from its banking platform to its cybersecurity. Investment will also flow to anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing tools, and to the Financial Intelligence Unit that runs them. Dalia Khalifa, the World Bank’s director for the Middle East, tied the project to Syria’s economic recovery, calling a modern financial system essential to the country’s future.

A test of standards

Governor Mohamed Safwat Raslan called the approval a milestone for the country’s banking infrastructure and a step toward standards used across global finance. He told the Syrian Arab News Agency the Central Bank would keep working to restore confidence and to return Syria to the international financial system. The International Development Association grant carries no repayment obligation, which lowers the fiscal risk for a state whose revenues have fallen sharply since 2011. Whether the reforms hold will depend on the strength of the new oversight. When the World Bank grants $100 million to Syria, the harder task is not the transfer but the accountability that comes after.

  • 3 min read
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