High-profile divorces usually come with polished, wordy statements that have been pored over by publicists and attorneys, but that doesn’t seem to be the case for the daughter of Dubai’s leader. Sheikha Mahra bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum appears to have announced her divorce to her husband in a straightforward Instagram post on Wednesday, just over a year into their marriage.
“Dear Husband,” the princess wrote on her verified Instagram page. “As you are occupied with other companions, I hereby declare our divorce. I divorce you, I divorce you, and I divorce you,” she continued, employing the controversial practice of triple talaq, which allows Muslim men to divorce their wives by simply declaring “I divorce you” three times. She signed her note with “Take care, your ex-wife.”
Sheikha Mahra, 30, is one of the 26 children of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the prime minister and vice-president of the United Arab Emirates. Mahra isn’t the first of his daughters to make it known that she’s not happy with her life in the kingdom. Two of the others — Sheikha Latifa and Sheikha Shamsa — tried to escape but were caught, returned to Dubai, and jailed. Meanwhile, one of his wives, Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein, escaped from Dubai to the U.K. in 2019, saying she feared for her life. She finalized a contentious divorce from him that year, with a British judge finding that “there will remain a clear and ever-present risk to [Princess Haya] for the remainder of her life,” per the BBC.
Princess Mahra married Sheikh Mana bin Mohammed bin Rashid bin Mana Al Maktoum in May 2023, and they welcomed their first child, a daughter, two months ago, per People. In early June, Mahra posted a picture of herself holding her baby with the caption “Just the two of us.”
