Mouhannad Jarrouj

Agency: Leo Dubai

Mouhannad Jarrouj’s path into advertising was far from a straight line. Born in Syria and raised between Kuwait, the UAE, and Damascus, he started out studying architecture, then moved into jewelry sales — until a test brief in 2010 flipped everything and set him on the road to Arabic copywriting.

For the past 15 years, he’s been reshaping what it means to be an Arabic Copywriter. In a field that often puts English first, Mouhannad pushed back against the “just a translator” box and showed that Arabic can lead ideas, not just follow them. With a mix of sharp humor, cultural intuition, and the ability to find insights that translation alone misses, he’s become known for flipping the script — literally asking what happens when you think right-to-left instead of left-to-right. At Leo Burnett Dubai, Mouhannad has helped win work for Heinz, McDonald’s, ENBD, Geely, Puma, Cheez-It, Samsung, Omantel, and Central Bank UAE. Along the way, he’s worked on campaigns that made noise and made a difference: Puma x Al Hilal’s Play for Real that trended region-wide, Heinz’s Bland is Banned that lit up social feeds, and McDonald’s UAE’s National Day campaign that reconnected the brand with its people.