Mahmoud Ayach, lookalike of the Arabic-speaking spokesperson of the Israeli army, in Zghorta, on April 23, 2026. (Credit: Lucile Wassermann/L’Orient-Le Jour)
He never asked for this. Yet, his face alone was enough to turn his life upside down. Mahmoud Ayach, 38, has become, in spite of himself, the look-alike of one of the region’s most hated men: Avichay Adraee, the Arabic-language spokesperson for the Israeli army. This Lebanese man has always lived in Zghorta, but not a day or even an hour goes by without surprised or amused looks directed at him on the street. Mahmoud would have preferred to look like "just about anyone else" rather than the bearer of evacuation orders and warnings of imminent bombings. The face of Adraee, who could easily pass for an Arab — both in appearance and accent (his maternal grandparents are from Iraq and his father’s side from Turkey and Syria) — first appeared during the July 2006 war. But it is since the war in Gaza in 2023, and then in Lebanon,...
He never asked for this. Yet, his face alone was enough to turn his life upside down. Mahmoud Ayach, 38, has become, in spite of himself, the look-alike of one of the region’s most hated men: Avichay Adraee, the Arabic-language spokesperson for the Israeli army. This Lebanese man has always lived in Zghorta, but not a day or even an hour goes by without surprised or amused looks directed at him on the street. Mahmoud would have preferred to look like "just about anyone else" rather than the bearer of evacuation orders and warnings of imminent bombings. The face of Adraee, who could easily pass for an Arab — both in appearance and accent (his maternal grandparents are from Iraq and his father’s side from Turkey and Syria) — first appeared during the July 2006 war. But it is since the war in Gaza in 2023, and then in...
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