Alaa was born and raised in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in Canada. When she was fifteen she moved to Zawia, Libya. During her studies in medicine and in the midst of the 2011 Libyan Revolution, Alaa founded the Voice of Libyan Women to focus on challenging societal and cultural norms to make that the case all the time. Many VLW programs, like the Noor Campaign, which uses Islamic teaching to combat violence against women, have been replicated internationally. Alaa was recently appointed as an advocate for the Sustainable Development Goals. Alaa was recently appointed as an advocate for the Sustainable Development Goals and an UN/WHO commissioner for public health and employment.