After a video went viral showing Ibtihal Aboussad (now a former Microsoft employee of Moroccan nationality) publicly confronting Mustafa Suleyman, Microsoft AI CEO, during an event attended by Bill Gates and other tech heavyweights, public interest in Suleyman has surged. Her sharp rebuke, “Mustafa, shame on you,” is now all over social media. But then, who exactly is this Mustafa, the man leading one of the most influential AI departments in the world, and why was he being warned not to let his work contribute to the killing of Palestinians?
Growing up
Born in 1984 in north London to a Syrian father and English mother, Mustafa Suleyman’s story reflects that of many second-generation children of Muslim heritage in the West—raised at the mix of diasporic ambition and cultural estrangement. His father, who migrated to the UK for greener pastures, worked as a taxi driver, while his English mother, a nurse, reportedly converted to Islam in the 1980s, influenced by Cat Stevens. However, both parents—and Suleyman himself—are said to have left Islam.
Like many migrant families, Mustafa’s father faced economic hardship. Suleyman attended Thornhill Primary School, a state institution in Islington, followed by Queen Elizabeth’s School, a boys’ grammar school in Barnet. At 16, however, his life took a turn—his parents separated, each relocating abroad, leaving him and his younger brother to navigate the world independently. During these formative years, Mustafa’s entrepreneurial spirit emerged, running a fruit juice and milkshake stall in Camden Town while securing a place at Oxford University to study philosophy and theology. However, after just one year, he dropped out.
Navigating Faith and Ideology
Despite his declared atheism, some websites have unknowingly hailed Mustafa Suleyman as a role model for Muslim youth. This is possibly due to his role in co-founding the Muslim Youth Helpline alongside Mohammed Mamdan. The helpline, created in the wake of the 9/11 tragedy, aimed to offer counselling and support to young Muslims navigating an increasingly hostile world. This shows that Mustafa might have had the Muslim cause in mind. However, in a 2019 podcast, he remarked that religion was “not for him.”
In his youth, Mustafa embraced the liberal ideals that have drawn many young people in the West. He became involved in climate change campaigns. It was during one of these engagements, however, that he found his true calling in technology. In 2009, at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Mustafa was disillusioned by the ineffective rhetoric of world leaders on emission reductions. This frustration led him to reconsider the impact of traditional political approaches and recognise that technology, particularly the rapidly expanding realm of social media, could offer a more scalable solution.
Venturing into Tech
Through his friends’ brother, Demis Hassabis, and Shane Legg—both PhD students in computational neuroscience at University College London—Mustafa was introduced to artificial intelligence. This encounter set the stage for the founding of DeepMind, the AI lab that would swiftly emerge as one of the leading startups in the field. DeepMind’s crowning achievement was AlphaGo, the first AI system to defeat a human champion at the ancient game of Go in 2015. The company garnered the attention of high-profile entrepreneurs like Elon Musk, Scott Banister, Peter Thiel, and Jaan Tallinn, who became early investors and advisers. In 2014, DeepMind was acquired by Google for around $500 million, making Suleyman and his team wealthy beyond imagination.
Mustafa Suleyman has consistently positioned himself as a campaigner against artificial intelligence’s potential dangers and inherent risks. He once appeared in an interview alongside Yuval Noah Harari for The Economist, discussing the complexities of AI’s future. Reflecting on the confusion of the COVID-19 lockdowns, Suleyman coauthored The Coming Wave: Technology, Power, and the 21st Century’s Greatest Dilemma. In this book, he explores the threats posed by AI. He criticised the use of facial recognition-equipped sunglasses by police officers in China. Meanwhile, his company is now involved in similar technology for Israel.
Dining with the Devil
Mustafa’s journey took a turn in 2019 when he was “forced” to step down from his leadership role at Google DeepMind. That December, he announced he would leave DeepMind to assume a policy position at Google. However, by January 2022, Suleyman departed Google to co-found Inflection AI, a new lab to create a more socially attuned AI. Inflection AI’s product, Pi, was designed with “a good EQ”—an artificial intelligence capable of understanding and responding to human emotion. Yet, Inflection AI was acquired by Microsoft in March 2024, leading Suleyman to take on the role of CEO of Microsoft AI, a newly formed division focused on advancing the company’s consumer AI research and products.
Despite Mustafa Suleyman’s frequent rhetoric on the ethics of artificial intelligence, the reality is stark. Microsoft Azure AI services, which Israel employs in its ongoing genocide in Gaza, fall under the broader umbrella of Microsoft AI, the division Suleyman now leads. This raises questions: Is Mustafa simply a hypocrite, or does he, perhaps, not consider Palestinians part of the broader human family he often speaks of? Or is there a deeper, more personal animus against his Muslim heritage?
Today, Mustafa Suleyman is widely celebrated in the US and the UK. He has received accolades such as the Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire and the Silicon Valley Visionary Award. He serves on the board of The Economist and is a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Centre for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. However, despite these prestigious titles, he remains far from an exemplary figure for Muslim or Arab youth. His journey embodies the failings of a society that has, in many ways, allowed him to stray from his roots. Born a Muslim, he has lost not only his faith but also his sense of humanity.
0 Comment