Twitch is criticized for content about the Israel-Gaza war on the platform

A lawmaker's accusation that Twitch has seen an “increase in anti-Semitism” since Hamas's attack on Israel last year has put the streaming platform at the center of increasing scrutiny over its handling of content related to that war.

Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., wrote a letter to the Amazon-owned platform last week, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, calling for an investigation into one of its key political creators, Hasan Piker, and claiming many of They are in office. His videos contain “anti-Semitic rhetoric.” Several streams are linked in the letter's footnotes, including short clips in which Piker expresses support for the Palestinian people and criticizes Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Piker told NBC News that many of the videos cited in the letter were taken out of context. He noted that in many of the videos Torres denounced, Piker criticized the Israeli government and not the Jewish people.

Members of Congress often write letters calling for an investigation into various matters, even if not all of them result in investigations. Still, the letter represents one of the popular streaming platform's more prominent calls for content regulations related to the Israel-Hamas war.

In recent years, Twitch has become a hub for political pundits. YouTubers regularly stream debates about political issues, and some politicians — including Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz — have appeared on the platform to discuss politics, sometimes while playing video games. However, unlike other social media platforms, Twitch has been able to largely avoid controversies between Israel and Gaza over the last year.

However, critics of the platform – including Torres – have argued that hate against Jewish people has been prevalent over the past year, despite Twitch's community guidelines, which “do not permit behavior motivated by hatred, prejudice or intolerance.”

When reached for comment from a Twitch spokesperson, NBC News referred to a Nov. 1 blog post from Twitch CEO Dan Clancy.

“There is no place for racism, hate or harassment of any kind on Twitch, including anti-Semitism and Islamophobia,” Clancy wrote in the blog post addressed to the Twitch community, adding that the platform “works hard to ensure that our community “This is a safe place.”

There is no place for racism, hate, or harassment of any kind on Twitch, including anti-Semitism and Islamophobia

-Twitch CEO Dan Clancy, in a Nov. 1 blog post addressed to the Twitch community

Piker, who has 2.7 million followers on Twitch, said the attacks on the platform were unjustified.

“They're just trying to shut down Twitch completely because it committed the crime of not punishing me,” Piker, who goes by his usernames HasanAbi and HasanTheHun online, said in an interview with NBC News in response to Torres' letter.

The Turkish-American streamer said he had been “doxxed and beaten” by bad actors on the platform, citing alleged past incidents that he said made him consider leaving Twitch.

But Piker said he has “actually fought anti-Semitism” throughout his career as a public broadcaster, dating back to his time on the progressive YouTube show “The Young Turks,” created and directed by his uncle Cenk Uygar.

“You just have to cut out things about complex geopolitical situations in 15-second increments to say, 'Look, he means exactly the opposite of what he says,'” Piker said of the clips in Torres' letter.

The criticism of Piker came the same month that Twitch was accused of disabling some users in Israel and the Palestinian territories from signing up for the platform.

The platform apologized on October 20, writing that after Hamas's attack on Israel on October 7, it had “temporarily disabled registration with email verification in Israel and Palestine” to “prevent uploading of graphic material in the to prevent connection with the attack”. to protect the safety of users.”

According to Twitch, sign-ins to the platform were not completely disabled as users could opt to sign in with phone verification. However, the platform said it “inadvertently…re-enabled email verification sign-ups for neither region.”

“We deeply regret this unacceptable omission and the confusion it has caused,” the platform said. “We have fixed the issue so that all affected users can log in with email confirmation.”

That same week, Twitch imposed a 30-day ban on a group of streamers, many of whom are Arab, for “hateful behavior” during their panel discussion at TwitchCon in San Diego in September.

Streamers CapriSunnPapi, Fr0gan, Raffoulticket, DenimsTV and Vio discussed which popular streamers on the platform are allowed to use the Arabic term of endearment “Habibi” and which are not, which translates to “my love”. Their list placed pro-Israel streamers at the bottom and Arab streamers at the top. They were ranked from “Arabic” to “loves Sabra,” an American and Israeli brand of hummus.

“Ngl. I'm going to take a few days off and go live again and review hummus just to prove my point. #hummusgate,” wrote CapriSunnPapi on X.

Raffoulticket, who is Jewish, called the panel's critics “so anti-Semitic that I'm the one who made the list asking 'Who can say Habibi' and they are trying to use this as 'Frogan ranking people of Arabs.' “to 'Jews',” he added. Critics should “keep Jews out of their mouths.”

DenimsTV retweeted author Jake Steinberg, who referenced Piker and wrote that he was “truly grateful to have such a knowledgeable Jewish ally like Hasan, who is so prominent on the internet.”

NBC News has reached out to the temporarily suspended creators for further comment.

While there was initially no backlash at TwitchCon, online criticism grew in October when streamer Ethan Klein, host of the H3 podcast on YouTube, posted a video titled “Twitch has a big problem” in which he said, that he thinks the panel is “somehow Arabic” good, Jew bad.”

“I suspect that Twitch has an anti-Semitism problem,” Klein, who is Jewish, said in his Oct. 18 video on YouTube, which mentions the TwitchCon panel.

The Anti-Defamation League, a nonprofit organization that tracks anti-Semitism and other injustices, also spoke out on Oct. 21, writing in a statement that it had spoken to Twitch employees “after becoming aware of several concerning incidents was”.

“Twitch must learn from this situation and improve how it deals with anti-Semitism and hate on its platform, which is an ongoing and significant challenge,” the ADL wrote in a post on X.

The organization, which has been criticized for what some see as pro-Israel advocacy and bias, said it encourages Twitch to “take meaningful actions such as engaging with the platform's Jewish community, providing anti-Semitism training for employees.” , streamers and presenters and updating how they check the programs of their live events.”

Fr0gan defended the panel and the “Habibi List” comment in a post on ”

“The basis of my podcast “Ayyrabs with Capri and Raff” is that we are all Arabs with different religious backgrounds – I am Muslim, Capri is Christian and Raff is Jewish. Sabra hummus is objectively the worst hummus available and matches the unfortunate hummus quality in the US,” Frogan added.

Also in October, Twitch imposed a 14-day ban on an account run by Zack “Asmongold” Hoyt after he made comments about the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza, saying they came from an “inferior culture.”

Hoyt posted a video response addressing the comments. He also posted a statement on

“I’ll do better,” he added.

In Piker's opinion, Twitch is the social media platform that has done the best job of weeding out bad actors and keeping their personalities from promoting hateful material.

In 2021, Piker was temporarily banned from Twitch for using a derogatory term for white people. He said he was also warned by the platform when he exceeded the limit for viewing certain content, such as Houthi music videos. The Ansarallah Group, a group of Yemeni rebels commonly known as the Houthis, is classified as a terrorist group by the US State Department.

Piker described Twitch's application of the terms of service as “rigorous” in his opinion. He has a strong presence on other platforms, including YouTube, where he has 1.42 million subscribers, and TikTok, where he has 925,000 followers.

“It is actually one of the most rigorously applied TOS systems on any platform,” Piker said. “I am a content creator. I know all of these platforms very well. Twitch has the best terms of service, that’s true because they actually apply their terms of service.”

In his letter, Torres called on Twitch to “stop popularizing those who popularize anti-Semitism” and announced a possible congressional investigation.

“Congress has taken a close look at the increased anti-Semitism that spread after October 7,” he wrote. “Just as no one is above the law, no company in America – not even Twitch – is above congressional oversight.”

Over the weekend, Twitch appeared to quietly introduce a new warning label for streams that discuss broader “political and sensitive social issues.” This includes “discussions about elections, civic integrity, war or military conflicts, and civil rights,” the platform says.

Labeling is still not required for “streams that contain informational or educational content intended to share knowledge in a neutral, fact-based manner rather than to advocate in any way for an issue or candidate.”

In his blog post, Twitch CEO Clancy reiterated the company's hateful conduct policy, which prohibits “conduct motivated by hate, prejudice or intolerance.”

“Millions of streamers with diverse views and perspectives spend time on Twitch,” he wrote. “We recognize that some content, although permitted on our Service, may be offensive to some members of our community. The views shared by streamers on Twitch are neither the views of Twitch nor my personal views.”

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