Crackdowns on LGBTIQ+ communities across the MENA region are on the rise, although the catalysts for such a wave of queerphobic repression are insufficiently theorized and understood. Extant research posits that anti-LGBTIQ+ repression in the region is predomenantly driven by authoritarian states seeking to legitimize their authority. Scholars have argued that anti-LGBTIQ+ repression reflects strategic calculations on the part of autocrats, distracting from policy failures in times of crisis, and promoting their rule as an effective safeguard against the imposition of foreign social norms. Such theories often fall short from explaining variation in how autocratic states have approached LGBTIQ+ rights activism and do not square with the reality on the ground. In this article, I argue that backlash against LGBTIQ+ rights unfolds somewhat similarly in democracies and autocracies alike. Drawing on case studies and original qualitative data from Lebanon, Palestine, and Tunisia, this article traces the spread of queerphobic populism and its global diffusion positing that this phenomenon underlies much of what we conceptualize as anti-LGBTIQ+ backlash, and explains the latter as the joint production of both state and non-state actors. The article, in turn, tackles the varying methods, temporal aspects, and motivating factors behind anti-LGBTQ+ repression in the region and explores the importance of factors exogenous to incumbent regime. It also aims to bring into sharper focus how LGBTQ+ collectives negotiate their visibility within the confines of repressive political regimes and hostile publics.