She was one of the speakers at the anti-war rally in March 2003 in London[1] and is the co-founder of the Culture Project, a platform for Kurdish feminists, writers and activists.

[1] Mahmoud grew up under the regime of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, and her earliest memories were of the Iran-Iraq war of 1980–88.

She started reading feminist literature, which inspired her activism against patriarchal violence, in particular honour killings, female genital mutilation, and forced marriages.

[2][3] Mahmoud received an MA in Gender Studies from SOAS.

[6] The accounts took two years to gather, though the work of Culture Project and features women from the ages of twenty to seventy, including activist Lanja Khawe.