Anna Wintour, the Vogue figurehead and fashion icon, mingled in Doha, Qatar, over the weekend alongside Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, the mother of the Qatari emir, who has drawn controversy for celebrating the slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar after he was killed by Israeli forces operating in Gaza last year.

“The name Yahya means the one who lives,” Moza wrote on social media in October 2024, mourning the man who orchestrated the Oct. 7 attacks. “They thought him dead but he lives. Like his namesake, Yahya bin Zakariya, he will live on and they will be gone.”

Wintour, Vogue’s global editorial director and chief content officer for Condé Nast, was pictured sitting next to the sheikha during the Fashion Trust Arabia awards ceremony at the National Museum of Qatar on Saturday.

Moza, who is among the most famous women leaders in the Arab world and seen as a Middle East style icon, has been a fierce critic of Israel following Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attacks — frequently using her social media platform to denounce the Jewish state and to spread anti-Israel content.

The sheikha has been described as “the public face of Qatar,” which has drawn criticism from American lawmakers for hosting Hamas leadership. 

Wintour, who recently relinquished her title as the U.S. editor of Vogue, was also in Doha on Sunday to co-host the inaugural Franca Fund Gala at the Qatar Museum of Islamic Art, which celebrated the legacy of the late Franca Sozzani, former longtime editor of Vogue Italia who died in 2016.

A spokesperson for Vogue did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.