Why you shouldnt platform a war criminal…

➡ The Nelk Boys, a popular YouTube group, faced backlash after interviewing Benjamin Netanyahu amid the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. They lost over 10,000 subscribers and tried to balance the situation by hosting Egyptian-American comedian Basim Yousif. The group, known for pranks and vlogs, has a large influence over young males and has recently incorporated political views into their content, including support for Donald Trump. Despite criticism, they continue to use their platform to share their beliefs and opinions.

On July 21, 2025 amid the current starvation the Israeli military is imposing on the Palestinians in Gaza, Some of those kids are, that’s real starvation stuff, I see it. And you can’t fake that. the Nelk Boys hosted the war criminal and literal demon himself, Benjamin Netanyahu. This interview caught an insane amount of criticism from their audience, as well as the general public. The From their immediate damage control livestream to hosting Egyptian-American comedian Basim Yousif, a prominent voice on the Israel-Palestine conflict just a week later, in an attempt to even the playing field, it was clear the Nelk Boys regretted the situation.

According to Social Blade, the group lost more than 10,000 subscribers, and the interview ultimately backfired, serving only to promote an Israeli narrative that many have repeatedly debunked. The podcast was led by the founder of Nelk, Kyle Forjard, along with fellow member Steinie whose real name is Aaron Steinberg. For those unaware of the Nelk Boys, they were originally founded in Ontario, Canada with Kyle, Jesse, and a third member. The crew began to gain a solid following for their outlandish pranks, and eventually as the Nelk brand grew, they moved to the states where they began to cement themselves in the world of YouTube content creators.

Over time the content shifted from just pranks, to party vlogs, skits, and eventually adding a podcast in recent years. The group expanded over time and eventually lost some of the original members, with Kyle being the OG carrying the torch. The Nelk Boys managed to amass a huge and extremely loyal fanbase, primarily consisting of teenage boys and young college students across the country. They’ve sold millions just from merch alone, and in recent years launched their own brand of seltzers, HappyDad, with their loyal fans lining up outside of stores generating millions in sales since their launch in 2021.

So it’s safe to say these guys have a large influence over the suburban middle class male youth, and well, with great influence comes great responsibility. Aside from promoting sports betting, alcohol, and excessive partying to their young and loyal followers, they have in recent years begun to incorporate their political views into their channel, primarily their support for current president Donald Trump. Now, I’m not here to judge whether they should or should not be allowed to do that, I mean that’s kinda the whole point of free speech. You have the right to share your beliefs and opinions on a platform you’ve established, let’s get that straight.

But that doesn’t void you of criticism for what one chooses to promote. Around late 2020 the Nelk Boys were invited on Air Force One to meet President Donald Trump, with their video gaining tons of praise from their audience, partly for even getting the opportunity, granted most vaguely aware of them viewed them as just a bunch of YouTube pranksters, only to personally end up shaking hands with the current president of the United States. Articles like this one here meet the YouTube bros who might help Trump win in 2024 point out their immense influence.

Of course, everything is done strategically. At the time Trump was hoping to maintain his position as POTUS while running against Joe Biden. By leveraging the fan base of Nelk which has over 8 million subscribers on their YouTube page and over 4 million Instagram followers, it was a last ditch effort by the Trump administration to garner more votes from the young man following these guys. As we know Trump did not win that election but the benefit was still strong. Granted just 4 years later we saw immense support for Trump to take over and regain his spot eventually becoming the 47th president.

In 2022 as Trump was gearing up to garner support for the 2024 election, he appeared on the full send podcast. This video was another hit with their audience, which largely aligned with their support for Trump, and it was very clear that Nelk was directly influencing their audience to vote a particular way. The video was taken down by YouTube shortly after it was published due to misinformation according to the policies. This of course was used by Trump to speak on increasing censorship, playing into his mega followers hopes of him coming back into office to restore freedom of speech in America.

And I have stopped all government censorship and brought back free speech in America. It’s back. And brought back free speech in America. Stop the cap. The following year in March 2023 they posted a video to their main channel titled Full Send in Israel. This video gained 7.5 million views and was received well by their audience. Mind you this was posted exactly 7 months before tensions in the region rose with the October 7th attacks. In this video it was clear that the young men were being used to showcase Israel in a positive light while undermining the true reality of the nation.

Taken on a carefully curated tour and of course like most politicians around the world they went to the western wall in Jerusalem. Placing their hand on the wall all to promote the nation and their culture to their millions of impressionable fans. At one point in the video the group is taken on a bus to see the more tense sides of the nation. Where they simulated the IDF rating the bus as a strange joke. Which then led to them receiving a lecture by the IDF soldiers and given the chance to see behind the training the soldiers get to I don’t know fight women and children I guess.

Later in the video they gave their audience a very poor portrayal of the Palestinian side with a man in a pretty worn down brick home with his children and a fire in what was probably once a decent living room. The way the videos edited was undoubtedly meant to show how Israelis are this civilized respectful society while the Palestinians or what they would consider the Arabs are just these barbaric people that don’t respect the land or the Israeli people. But again since this video was filmed well before the October 7th attack and the ongoing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza the comments at the time didn’t really get at them that much.

Now fast forward a year and some change later Nelk was yet again showing their support for Trump leading up to the 2024 elections. With Trump gunning for his spot he made the rounds on several podcasts primarily with large young male audiences ranging from Joe Rogan flagrant and of course Nelk. His team clearly understands how to tap into that audience and use it to his advantage. Granted Trump won the recent elections it was certainly the right move on his part to leverage the fan bases of these podcasters. Fast forward to July 2025 the Nelk boys hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on their podcast.

Lacking a solid understanding of Netanyahu himself or the policies and positions of the nation he leads they ended up giving him a platform for nearly an hour of what amounted to pro-Israel propaganda aimed at their young audience. Netanyahu spread the typical lies that Israel is just this moral nation trying to live peacefully in the Middle East but those pesky Palestinians and Hamas simply don’t want any peace and are the ones causing all the problems in the region. Practically all of what he spoke on in the interview has been debunked by Jewish historians like Norman Finkelstein, Ilhan Pape and countless others.

Hell even mainstream media has debunked the claims. The Nelk boys clearly were not the right people to hold this kind of interview. They came seriously unprepared to the conversation with practically no attempts at pushing back on Netanyahu’s outrageous lies and instead yapped about Burger King vs McDonald’s. They did ask about why Netanyahu was so hated around the world as well as the notion that Israel is starving the Gaza population. But he sidestepped those questions quickly throwing the blame on Hamas. But aside from leveraging Nelk boys massive audience Netanyahu knew he could use their platform since he could reach a young audience without being pressed with any real questions and strong arming the whole show.

Granted he’s declined interviews with people much more equipped for the conversation. You know I recommend you watch the interview yourself to hear the bogus lies but it’s pretty hard to sit there and listen to the demon himself yap for that long. Following the interview they obviously saw the stats and probably shit their pants plus they said themselves they received tons of messages from friends many Jewish and non-Jew frustrated with them even giving him their platform. Before the interview began they both had this to say Clearly they knew this was going to ruffle feathers.

Immediately after they streamed on kick featuring guys like Hassan Piker, Sneko, Nick Fuentes and Myron Gaines in a desperate attempt to save face by platforming creators who are very vocal about their anti-Israel stance but at this point the damage was done. Over 200,000 dislikes 30,000 comments it was clear even their audience was not rocking with them. Now when it comes to how this interview came about Kyle addressed on this stream saying the following So this is certainly possible Granted Trump and Netanyahu are closely connected and Trump has already proven that using their platform was beneficial for him.

Now to get a bit conspiratorial for a second there are also speculations that it has something to do with Steine’s father Harvey Steinberg who is a prominent lawyer. He is a partner at Springer and Steinberg PC and is known for representing athletes and high-profile individuals. Mr. Steinberg as far back as 2004 represented Israeli businessman Asher Carney an orthodox Jew former IDF soldier who was illegally exporting parts that could be used to build nuclear weapons which obviously raises some red flags. I mean criminal defense lawyers walk a fine line in society as some see what they do as commendable while others harshly criticize their ability to defend hardened criminals.

People speculate on whether all these connections to Israel and this heavy interest in promoting the nation and the prime minister come from the back of their prominent Jewish American member Aaron Steinberg. Now again this is just speculation but I mean it’s certainly not out of the realm of possibility. Anyway what I hope you take away from this video is that these popular channels, podcasters, influencers, whatever you want to call them aren’t to be trusted. They themselves get so big that they end up getting used to push the wrong things whether they realize it or not.

Basim Yousif said it best on his recent appearance with Nelk. So you you were recruited in March 2023 and you were activated in July 2025. Oh and what makes that notion that Steinberg might have had a bigger hand in this than one thinks is how during the hour-long interview with Basim he barely said a word. Basim would try to engage with him and he would just give short one or two word responses for the most part. He practically remained silent almost like he was genuinely disinterested in what Basim had to share or was fearful of how his Zionist supporting friends and family would think of him.

As they say, silent speaks louder than words. Also a few times during the interview Kyle says he’s scared to talk about what they’re discussing. I mean this is like some deep shit. I’m kind of honestly scared to talk about it. No why talk about it? Which only implies that Israel is a force bent on fear tactics to muzzle any opinions opposing their regime. All in all this interview will go down as a horrible moment in the Nelk boys career. And while they’re likely going to retain their large fan base as things will continue to die down, granted people are quick to forget, this was undoubtedly a massive stain on the brand.

All to promote Israel in a positive light, they tarnished their own name. You know as really in American politicians often reference Genesis chapter 12 verse 3 which states I will bless those who bless you and whoever curses you I will curse and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you. And that part of the scripture is up for major debate in terms of its interpretation. However it’s becoming increasingly clear even to those vastly undereducated on the topic that blessing Israel really does nothing but benefit the Zionist regime and leave a mess for those trying to serve them.

[tr:trw].