One of Twitch’s most popular streamers was suspended from the platform over the weekend for reading the manifesto of the suspect in the killing of two Israeli Embassy staffers last week.
Hasan Piker, a streamer with nearly 3 million Twitch followers and 1.6 million YouTube subscribers, is known for broadcasting far-left content under the handle HasanAbi. In a May 23 YouTube video titled “What People Miss About The DC Israeli Embassy Shooting,” Piker went through the manifesto of Elias Rodriguez word for word.
Rodriguez was charged with two counts of first-degree murder and multiple firearm-related counts after Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim were killed outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday night.
In the video, Piker expressed a desire to “understand the mindset” of Rodriguez, who shouted “Free, free Palestine!” as he was arrested.
“The reason why I read this manifesto … is oftentimes to understand the mindset of this person, especially when there are a lot of mainstream narratives that will immediately design an alternative scenario,” Piker said in the video.
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“I don’t think that this person acted out on an antisemitic desire or is a f—ing Nazi or anything like that, but that is dangerous in a separate way,” he continued. “The very fact that a person who is this legible, who has their s–t together enough to be able to write a f—ing, write prose such as this one, in the act of vengeance, in the acts of vigilante justice in his own mind, is meaningful in and of itself.”
Piker disputed claims that the shooter, who killed the victims outside an event held by the American Jewish Committee, was antisemitic – despite the fact that Lischinsky was an Israeli Christian and Milgrim was an American Jew. The pair worked together and planned to marry.
“The idea that this is a neo-Nazi that came after Jewish people, deliberately looking for Jews to kill, like all of that stuff, is incorrect,” Piker said. “This is not a value judgment on the actions of the shooter, but it’s obvious that this was a person that was brain-broken by a lot of the realities that are unfolding in Gaza.”
In a Saturday post on X, Piker announced the suspension and shared an email from Twitch. The email stated that Piker violated a rule about the improper handling of terrorist propaganda content.
“Based on a review of your activity or content, we have issued a global suspension on your account,” the Twitch email said. “As a result, your access to Twitch services is temporarily restricted. Please be aware that repeated violations may lead to more serious actions on your account, including longer temporary suspensions or permanent suspension.”
In response, Piker claimed that Twitch’s terms of service “dictates a suspension for even critical examination of the manifesto.”
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“i believe this is a bad policy for news and press freedom,” Piker’s post read. “ill take the suspension, but hope twitch changes this policy in the future.”
Piker has been known for creating extremist content in the past. He has regularly broadcast propaganda from the Houthis, an Iranian-backed group in Yemen that has been designated by the U.S. as a terrorist group, and claimed that “America deserved 9/11” during a 2019 stream.
In March, Piker was temporarily suspended from Twitch after making a comment about murdering Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla.
“They’re not tackling providers; they’re not actually going after false billing. They are trying to cut recipients. [Fraud] is not happening at the point of recipient. If you cared about Medicare fraud or Medicaid fraud, you would kill Rick Scott,” Piker said.
The political commentator later walked back the statements, telling his social media followers that he was “sorry” over the incident.
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“I’ll choose my words carefully next time and say, ‘if Mike Johnson cares abt (sic) medicare fraud (since he wants to cut 800m from Medicaid/Medicare) he’d call for MAX PUNISHMENT for current fl gop senator/former gov Rick Scott- who has done the most Medicare fraud in us history!'” Piker’s post read.
Fox News Digital’s Nikolas Lanum contributed to this report.
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