Mohamed El-Sayed, a Saudi television and YouTube program host known for his religious affairs program Sawaed Al-Ikhaa, was detained by Saudi authorities in December 2025 and has not been heard from since.
Saudi authorities have not disclosed the reasons for his arrest, his current whereabouts, or his place of detention, and he has been denied contact with his family and access to legal counsel.
El-Sayed hosted Sawaed Al-Ikhaa, a program that was aired on the Saudi channel Al-Resalah for several seasons starting in 2013, before being taken off the air without an official explanation. The show later migrated to YouTube, where it amassed approximately 1.5 million subscribers.
Several of the program's most prominent early guests have been held in detention since 2017, including well-known Islamic preacher Salman Al-Ouda and Ali Al-Omari, chairman of the 4Shabab television channel, and one of eight journalists currently imprisoned in the kingdom.
El-Sayed's detention is part of a broader pattern of Saudi authorities holding journalists without formal charges, legal justification, or disclosure of detention locations.
The Saudi Embassy in Washington, D.C., did not respond to CPJ's request for comment.