Twitch streamer Hasan Piker is pushing Gen Z boys to the extreme left with twisted views on Israel, 9/11
The moral panic about Andrew Tate and his influence on young men has been massive — but what about the leftist, socialist and arguably antisemitic mega-streamer influencing millions of predominantly young male followers?
Hasan Piker, known to his 2.9 million Twitch followers as HasanAbi, appeals to the same 'bro' demographic as stereotypical right-leaning manosphere influencers — popping nicotine pouches, gaming on livestream and hitting up the gym as well as gun ranges — but he sells a very different ideology.
The 33-year-old New Jersey born streamer, who recently showed up at anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles in a bulletproof vest, has self-described as leftist, socialist and anti-capitalist. He holds enormous cultural sway with the Zoomers who flock to Twitch, a platform with more users in the 16- to 24-year-old demo than any other.
Advertisement
8 Hasan Piker has more than 7 million followers across Twitch, X, Instagram, and YouTube.
AP
Parents should have their eye on Piker, who has told his 7.3 million followers across platforms — multiple times — that America 'deserved 9/11' and that Jews are 'inbred.'
He is truly indefatigable and on Twitch for seven, eight, nine hours day, at least six days a week. As of June 18, Piker's only taken two days off since the month started, and streamed more than 10 hours on June 8.
Advertisement
Set up at his home monitor, the streamer flips through news clips and articles, from Al Jazeera to Fox News, and occasionally films himself gaming or giving dating advice. He will usually rack up more than a million views over the course of a stream.
8 Piker has said that America 'deserved 9/11' and that Jews are 'inbred.'
Instagram/@hasandpiker
Piker's stamina is matched only by that of his fans, who flood the comments at breakneck speed.
'May Allah awaken President Xi and allow him to see the evil doing of Israel and the United States,' one commenter said on a recent stream. Another chimed in when Piker showed a clip from Fox News: 'In a just world Fox News in its entirety would be lined up in the Hague for these lies and propaganda.'
Advertisement
Even after Piker logs off his hours-long video feed, the messages keep pouring in. In a recent livestream discussing Israel's conflict with Iran, he called Israel 'the giant baby nation with nuclear arms' and said its 'existence is a great shame and a serious stain.'
8 Hasan Piker suggested that the May Israeli Embassy shooting could have been a false flag operation.
YouTube/HasanAbi
Piker also suggested the May 21 Capital Jewish Museum shooting in DC, which left two young Israeli embassy staffers dead, was a 'false flag operation.'
'Every single thing that [accused shooter Elias Rodriguez] did in the aftermath of the shooting is so f–king crazy that it's like, you could not have designed a f–king incident like this,' he said on his livestream.
Advertisement
Major political figures on the left are clamoring to sit down with him.
8 Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appeared on Piker's livestream in March.
HasanAbi/YouTube
Pike got both AOC and Bernie Sanders on camera for an interview together in March, during which he gifted Rep. Ocasio-Cortez a booklet on the pro-Palestinian solidarity movement in Japan.
In a recent interview with NYC democratic socialist mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, the pair discussed government-run housing and supermarkets, free public transport and criminal justice reform.
'I want Austrian style, Red Vienna, 65% of the entire city is just peppered with government housing, that's what I want,' Piker said as they bonded over donuts.
8 Piker interviewed Zohran Mamdani, NYC's democratic socialist mayoral candidate.
HasanAbi/YouTube
'Let's talk about the unheard minority, the marginalized, people of wealth — POW — I feel like they're getting a hard bargain here with you,' Piker joked. 'Meritocracy, obviously real, Elon Musk worked the smartest and the hardest. Why do you hate the successful, wealthy people?'
Meanwhile, Piker drives a $200,000 Porsche Taycan and lives in a nearly $3 million, 3,800 square foot West Hollywood home.
Advertisement
He was launched into popular consciousness via a strange and somewhat eroticized New York Times profile in April, with the headline 'A Progressive Mind in a MAGA Body.'
8 Piker owns an airsoft gun and occasionally posts photos from gun ranges.
Instagram/@hasandpiker
'Mr. Piker's success on camera, in some part, has been aided by the fact that he is, by conventional standards, a very handsome man,' the profile fawned. 'He is 6 feet 4 inches tall and built like a professional athlete, with a square jaw, a beard and a head of thick dark hair.'
While parents should laugh off the drooling, they'd be remiss to dismiss Piker's influence on young men who see him as aspirational.
Advertisement
He's a different kind of male role model than popular-right wing influencers — the sort who tells reporters at pro-Palestine rallies that 'a strong man protects those who can't protect themselves' and whose fans search desperately for a workout routine to achieve his physique.
8 Young male followers praise Piker (right) for his physique, which has inspired some to seek out his workout routine.
@hasandpiker/Instagram
There's a simplistic narrative that young men are moving to the right politically while young women are going to the left. While this might be more true of Gen Z than with prior generations, the fact of the matter is, kids are liable to go down any number of online rabbit holes.
I know this as a Zoomer who grew up with YouTube and, as a tween and young teen, was led to the right and to the left at various times by algorithmic feedback loops.
Piker's socialism isn't exactly fringe in Gen Z. A 2022 Pew poll found more 18- to 29-year-olds had a positive view of socialism (44%) than capitalism (40%), and a 2024 YouGov survey found 25% of that same age group had a positive view of communism.
Advertisement
8 Piker streams up to 10 hours a day, at least six days a week, on Twitch.
Instagram/@hasandpiker
It's easier today than ever for a kid who's learning about the world to attach to a couple online voices — whether Andrew Tate or Hasan Piker — as portals to the outside world they're desperate to make sense of.
While the mainstream media has its panties in a bunch over influencers turning young men conservative, they're writing fawning puff pieces about the radical left-wing streamers pushing youth to the opposite extreme.
We should be equally concerned about kids getting radicalized in any direction — and all play our part in modeling skepticism, critical thinking and media literacy for a generation growing up in the internet age.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time Magazine
23 minutes ago
- Time Magazine
The Issues With Calling for a Regime Change in Iran
Some have called for a regime change in Iran. Though a change is unlikely to happen by itself, should President Donald Trump push for one, he would be making a grave mistake. It is not the first time that foreign powers have imagined Iran as a crumbling house—one that only needs a gentle push, or a series of airstrikes, before it falls into new hands. This was the fantasy in 1953, when the CIA and the British intelligence overthrew Mohammad Mossadegh, Iran's prime minister who had nationalized the country's oil, and delivered Iran to Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's autocratic rule. And this was also the fantasy in the 1980s, when Saddam Hussein invaded Iran with military and economic support from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Israel, who believed the newly revolutionary Iran would collapse in months. It was the fallacy in 2003, when the George W. Bush Administration imagined the ' axis of evil ' could be undone through further isolation of Iran. Now, the myth of a seamless regime change in Iran has been resurrected. 'As we achieve our objective we are also clearing the path for you to achieve your freedom,' Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video address to the Iranian people. The shape of Israel's effort is clear: sabotage operations, assassinations, and strikes. President Trump's response has varied widely. First, he sought out a renewed nuclear deal with Iran. Later, he demanded its ' unconditional surrender,' posting about the possibility of killing Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran. He moved American refueling jets closer to Europe and maintained a degree of ambiguity about the U.S. military's commitment to Israel. Since, he has come to support Israel's attacks on Iran. But Iran is not Syria, Libya, or Iraq. If President Trump joins the war on Iran and commits the United States to removing the Iranian regime, the results will likely be more catastrophic than the 2003 war on Iraq, which killed more than 1.2 million people, displaced more than nine million Iraqis, contributed to the emergence of the Islamic State, and cost the United States about $3 trillion. America's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan also contributed significantly to the squandering of its unipolar moment and setting off the decline of the American century. American analysts often underestimate the strength of the Iranian state, which is structured for survival. The Iranian military has a dual architecture designed to resist coups and invasions: Artesh, the regular armed forces of around 420,000 men across ground, naval, air, and air-defense forces, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an elite, ideologically driven military with roughly 190,000 personnel across ground, naval, and air branches. Beyond them is the Basij, a vast paramilitary network with hundreds of thousands of members embedded in every corner of Iranian society—in the streets, in neighborhoods, in schools, and mosques. They aren't just loyalists of Ayatollah but woven into a deeper idea of the state and committed to the independence of Iran. Despite Israel's extensive and quite successful campaign of assassinations targeting senior IRGC commanders, the core of this group has not been hollowed out but hardened. A younger generation of more ideologically rigid commanders has emerged. They came of age in a regional military power, see themselves as the stewards of an embattled regional order, and push for more aggressive postures toward the United States and Israel—stances their more pragmatic predecessors, shaped by the war with Iraq, often resisted. This new generation of Iranian military commanders has also been battle-hardened in close-quarter conflict in Syria and understand how wars of state collapse can unfold. If this war morphs into a war of state collapse—and it very well might—then what comes next will likely not be surrender. The Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force, which helped organize a patchwork of militias that bled American forces in Iraq for years, is well-positioned to do the same again. These networks—Lebanese, Iraqi, Syrian, Afghan—were built precisely to extend deterrence and sow instability in the event of direct conflict. Israel has deeply weakened Iran's axis of non-state actors in the region, but Tehran retains the ability to foment militias to fight against American and Israeli troops and interests. Bombing campaigns could significantly destroy military and civilian infrastructure in Iran but to replace the Iranian regime, President Trump has to be prepared to fight not just a standing army but a system with decades of experience in asymmetric warfare. Yesterday, Trump posted on social media that the U.S. will not kill Iran's Supreme Leader 'at least not for now.' But Iran is not governed by a single man or clique that can be decapitated. The Iranian state is a competitive authoritarian system with institutions that have evolved over a century. Even amid crises, the system generates new leaders, factions, and power centers. Even the deaths of some influential figures would not bring the system down—it would renew it. And Iran remembers: the invasions, the coups, the chemical attacks, and the long war of attrition it fought in the 1980s when the West bet on Saddam Hussain. At that time, the Islamic Republic was relatively young, with comparatively miniscule military resources, almost no idea of governance, and no battlefield experience. Saddam owned the skies. He wielded nerve gas. He had Western and Soviet support. Still, Iran did not fall. The war with Iraq scarred Iran, however it taught the country that survival does not require parity but endurance. In the decades since, the Iranian state has reorganized itself not for peace, but for siege. Its military doctrine is not built for conquest but for resistance. Iran won't simply absorb aerial bombardment or shrug off sabotage. Moreover, Iran is a civilizational state. The identity binding many Iranians is not limited to a flag or a government but rooted in a deeper historical memory stretching back through empire, invasion, forced partitions, foreign coups, and colonial interludes. To be sure, the Islamic Republic has inflicted great suffering upon the Iranian people and enraged many Iranian protestors, but to mistake that rage for a longing to be 'liberated' by foreign forces is to repeat the catastrophic delusions that defined the Iraq war in 2003. Iran's geography and demography will also affect the course of this conflict. Iran is four and a half times the size of Germany, with 92 million people. There are millions of Iranians who want an end to the Islamic Republic, but there are also millions who would fight any foreign attempt to decide what replaces it. The talk of regime change was no doubt intensified by the success of Israel's extensive intelligence campaign against Iran, leading to assassinations of Iran's military leaders and nuclear scientists, sabotage of defense facilities, and aerial dominance. But these operations, while exposing Iran's weakness and reducing its deterrence, also eviscerated the space for diplomacy and increased the possibility of violence and paranoia within the Iranian state. Some argue that Iran, under pressure and humiliated by foreign penetration, may be more willing to strike a deal and abandon its nuclear ambitions. But many in Iran's security establishment are likely to believe that only nuclear deterrence can ensure regime survival. The lesson they are likely to draw from the past two decades is that surrender does not lead to safety. Saddam gave up his weapons. He was invaded. Gaddafi gave up his nuclear program. He was overthrown. In this view, the path to survival for Iran is not disarmament—it is deterrence. Iran may not yet be racing to build a nuclear bomb, but if the regime comes to believe that collapse is inevitable without it, it may sprint to make sure no one else dares to come for them again. The irony is that the most ardent proponents of regime change in Iran may be accelerating the very nuclear program they claim to fear.
Washington Post
25 minutes ago
- Washington Post
Watch what happens when Fox pundits hired by Trump come back as guests
Several of President Donald Trump's most prominent appointees came either directly from Fox News or Fox Business, such as Defense Secretary Defense Pete Hegseth, Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy and interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro, or worked at the network in the past as a paid pundit or host, including Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino.
Newsweek
26 minutes ago
- Newsweek
Video of Theo Von Sounding Alarm on Possible War With Iran Takes Off Online
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Podcaster Theo Von, whose viral interviews and political guests have made him a notable figure in the online "manosphere," is under renewed spotlight after publicly questioning the United States' support for Israel and the potential for war with Iran. His commentary on the situation was revealed during the June 18 episode of his podcast, This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von, which has since circulated widely on social media. "I don't trust the Israel leader at all. I don't believe anything that guy (Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu) says. And I don't think that our soldiers should have to go and defend stuff that they start," Von said in the viral clip shared on X, formerly Twitter. The clip was viewed over half a million times in under 24 hours. He continued: "I'm not a soldier so I'm obviously speaking out of term, I'm not even brave enough to serve, so there's obviously that element. But that is kind of how I feel, I guess." Theo Von speaks to Jake Paul during President Donald Trump's inauguration at the U.S. Capitol on January 20, 2025. Theo Von speaks to Jake Paul during President Donald Trump's inauguration at the U.S. Capitol on January 20, 2025. Jasper Colt/Pool Photo via AP Why It Matters Von's remarks reflect a growing division within right-leaning media and political spheres over foreign policy, especially regarding Israel and the threat of a new war in the Middle East. Von, 45, has over 4 million subscribers on YouTube. While he is a pro-Trump media ally, Von is among a group of conservative and libertarian-leaning commentators urging restraint in foreign affairs. His concerns come at a time when President Donald Trump has publicly considered escalating U.S. involvement against Iran in support of Israel. What To Know Von's political visibility surged after he interviewed Trump in August 2024. His predominantly younger, male audience parallels a surge in votes seen for Trump in the 2024 election: 56 percent of young men voted for Trump in the 2024 election, per the Associated Press. Now, Von's stance aligns him with figures like former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, who have also expressed concerns about deepening U.S. military commitments overseas. In the June 18 podcast episode, Von said, "it feels like they're trying to push Trump" to go to war with Iran. "It's like, who makes that choice? Does he make that choice and then what do we get? You know, what's the win for us? We're just involved in some other thing while we have suffering here at home," he said. "That guy really scares me. I don't know why we support them. I don't understand that. I wish they would really give us a better explanation, especially after the massacres in Gaza," he added. Von, who has said he is a centrist politically, has been vocal about the Israel-Palestinian conflict. He previously stated that there is a "genocide" in Gaza and that the U.S. is "complicit." In May, Von joined Trump during a trip to the Middle East. The president embarked upon a high-profile tour of key Middle Eastern nations, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. During a visit to Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, Trump delivered a speech to U.S. and Qatari troops. Von spoke to the troops before Trump took the stage, delivering a routine that included jokes about drugs, disabilities, homosexuality, terrorism and Qatari culture. What People Are Saying President Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday: "I'm not looking to fight. But if it's a choice between fighting and [Iran] having a nuclear weapon, you have to do what you have to do, and maybe we won't have to fight." Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran, said in a public address: "The Americans should know that any U.S. military intervention will undoubtedly be accompanied by irreparable damage. The U.S. entering in this matter is 100 percent to its own detriment. The damage it will suffer will be far greater than any harm that Iran may encounter." Tucker Carlson, in a tense interview with Texas Senator Ted Cruz: "You're a senator who's calling for the overthrow of the government and you don't know anything about the country." What Happens Next Despite the vocal opposition from several prominent figures in conservative media, Trump has not ruled out military action against Iran. For Von, the backlash or support following his comments may shape his role in ongoing political discourse, particularly as the 2028 election cycle nears.
