Al-Sahaf became something of a celebrity, nicknamed Comical Ali (a play on Chemical Ali, Saddam's intelligence chief Ali Hassan al-Majid, who had ordered the use of chemical weapons against the Kurds in the 1980s).

萨哈夫在某种程度上成了名人，绰号“滑稽的阿里”(“化学阿里”是萨达姆的情报主管阿里·哈桑·马吉德的绰号，他曾在20世纪80年代下令对库尔德人使用化学武器)。