Moroccan-American rapper French Montana made headlines in August when his representatives announced he was engaged to Sheikha Mahra Mohammed Rashid Al Maktoum, the daughter of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the emir of Dubai and vice president of the United Arab Emirates.
Montana was on a podcast with fellow rappers Fat Joe and Jadakiss when he was asked how he met the princess. He said they had been introduced by a friend who knew one of her friends.
Joe asked Montana how he managed to end up with “the legitimate princess of Dubai,” to which the latter said, “It was one of my homeboys, he plugged me with her in Dubai.”
“I just happened to be in Dubai, and I remembered I had seen her; she had put up that post where she divorced somebody, and I am like, ‘I like her,’” the rapper said, adding that it “[takes] a lot of guts to throw that up.”
Joe said later that humans “don’t see her like that,” while talking about how Sheikha Mahra attended a party in honour of rapper Max B — also a guest on the show — coming home from jail. Max said she was “down to earth.”
Joe recounted an incident when he was in Dubai and met up with the city’s royals at a mall. He said while they treated him like family, when he got back to the hotel, his promoter looked at him bewildered and asked, “You know the Maktoums?” and added that “We’ve never seen these people in the mall in our lives.”
Joe and Montana agreed that the royal family were “good people”.
You may remember Sheikha Mahra for infamously announcing her divorce to her then-husband, Sheikh Mana bin Mohammed bin Rashid bin Mana Al Maktoum, through an Instagram post in July 2024. The post featured a note addressed to her “dear husband” and concluded with, “I divorce you, I divorce you, and I divorce you”. She shares a daughter with her ex-husband.
Shortly after, she launched a line of pricey perfumes called Divorce.
She and Montana, whose real name is Karim Kharbouch, were first linked in October 2024, when photos were shared of her showing him around Dubai. They reportedly went public with their romance this summer, when, according to Entertainment Today, they stepped out at several Paris Fashion Week events holding hands. – Dawn/Asia News Network
