A typical way to do this is using alternation in RE. You can dynamically generate the RE...

my @REs = qw(
    this
    that
    \w\d\w
);

my $re = join '|', @REs;  # join with | for alternation
$re = qr/($re)/;          # compile for efficiency

print "Matched $1\n" if $str =~ m/$re/;
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