In the past few months, Scooter Braun, a member of HYBE’s Board of Directors and the CEO of HYBE America, has been constantly criticized by fans of multiple HYBE artists for his active role in promoting Zionism amidst Israel’s onslaught on civilian life in the Gaza Strip of Palestine.
On April 21, KST, Braun took to his Instagram and shared a video where an Israeli soldier volunteers to take questions about Gaza from passersby on a street in the US. He carries a sign that says, “I was just in Gaza. Ask me anything.”
The video is composed of multiple abruptly cut clips of this particular soldier talking to different individuals on the street, explaining how Israeli soldiers are forced to kill civilians because Hamas, the Palestinian resistance fighters, allegedly put civilians on the line of fire. But the claim that has caused the most outrage was this soldier justifying why infants are killed in the Gaza Strip.
A woman confronts the soldier, saying, “I didn’t know infants could be a part of Hamas.” To this, the man astonishingly responds that Hamas can hold the infants onto them as they shoot Israeli civilians. When the woman contests this claim, saying nobody has seen evidence of this happening, the man responds that he has personally encountered such situations. The clip then has a jump cut to the woman suddenly agreeing with his viewpoint.
FUCK YOU, YOU DISGUSTING RACIST NAZI POSTING THIS ABOUT OUR CHILDREN HOW FUCKIN DARE YOU, YOU KNOW OUR CHILDREN ARE BEING SLAUGHTERED BY THE COLONIZERS. MORE THAN 15,000 PALESTINIAN CHILDREN HAVE BEEN MURDERED BY THE IOF. MORALLY DEPRAVED PIECE OF SHIT @scooterbraun https://t.co/l1FapLVrsG pic.twitter.com/3aPBJoaeay
— deeja⁷ 𓂆 🫒 (@deedeehimawari) April 20, 2024
The video, which contained some claims that have been contested and remain unsubstantiated, is being deemed as an attempt to manufacture consent for continuing the devastation of civilian life in Gaza. The comment about the infants, especially, has been met with fierce backlash, as many pointed out the lapses in the claim.
FUCK YOU, YOU DISGUSTING RACIST NAZI POSTING THIS ABOUT OUR CHILDREN HOW FUCKIN DARE YOU, YOU KNOW OUR CHILDREN ARE BEING SLAUGHTERED BY THE COLONIZERS. MORE THAN 15,000 PALESTINIAN CHILDREN HAVE BEEN MURDERED BY THE IOF. MORALLY DEPRAVED PIECE OF SHIT @scooterbraun https://t.co/l1FapLVrsG pic.twitter.com/3aPBJoaeay
— deeja⁷ 𓂆 🫒 (@deedeehimawari) April 20, 2024
oh scooter braun you are a disgusting genocidal nazi, trying to normalize and justify the mvrder of children. this is the type of person you employ @HYBEOFFICIALtwt #HYBEDivestFromZionism #하이브는시오니스트를퇴출하라
— na cam⁷ ! 🍉 (@seokfilmz) April 20, 2024
I literally saw this video on my tl right after I saw this tweet.
An entire family and the only survivor is a fetus..not a baby no, a fetus.@scooterbraun you will pay for this even if it was the last thing I do on this earth.#HYBEDivestFromZionism #하이브는시오니스트를퇴출하라 pic.twitter.com/LTzCpEGuC1— Meh!⁷ (Tamatem 🍅) (@bangtanbae22) April 20, 2024
As netizens pointed out, the human shield argument falls flat in front of the documented reality of infant deaths in Gaza. There have been multiple reported cases of children injured or dead from sniper shots, which are target-specific.
A report by The Guardian revealed that Palestinian children in Gaza are being deliberately targeted by Israeli snipers
Nine doctors reported evidence of children being targeted by snipers and quadcopters, citing that “sniper wounds were common” among children. pic.twitter.com/IHUFK3rRHn
— MintPress News (@MintPressNews) April 4, 2024
Israeli snipers shot and killed two brothers in Khan Yunis yesterday.
Nahid Adel Barbakh was shot by an Israeli sniper while evacuating Khan Yunis; his brother Ramiz tried to help him but was also sniped.
Israeli snipers shot anyone who tried to rescue them, both were… pic.twitter.com/CGeVqFNa97
— Palestine and MENA Info Center (@PALMENA_IC) January 25, 2024
Additionally, even if the human shield claims are proven valid, according to Amnesty International, Israel is still obligated under international humanitarian law to protect civilians, infants included.
Further, multiple Israeli military reservists, as well as politicians, have gone on record calling for the killing of Palestinian children, claiming that “there are no innocent children in Gaza.” These messages, interestingly, predate October 7, when Israel was brutally attacked by Hamas. For example, Ben Gvir, the Minister of National Security of Israel, was infamously documented in 2015 after taking part in a wedding celebration where the crowd cheered the killing of a Palestinian infant who was reportedly burned alive.
the baby who was burned alive is now part of depraved Israeli marriage rituals, where they take photos of him and stab it as a symbol for all Palestinian babies they want to burn and kill. Ben Gvir, now a top member of Netanyahu’s government, has joined in this genocidal ritual: pic.twitter.com/8QbmbkNw7o
— ☀️👀 (@zei_squirrel) November 20, 2023
Eliyahu Yossian, Israeli analyst and veteran of Unit 8200, an Israeli military spy unit:
“Babies are the enemy, pregnant women are the enemy, schoolchildren are the enemy.”
pic.twitter.com/zLMRv9pkUz
— Tiberius (@ecomarxi) December 27, 2023
“Israeli President says there are no innocent citizens in the Gaza Strip”
Around 60% of 2.3 million of the Gaza population are kids!
They are innocent unless you want to do a war crime!pic.twitter.com/H7iF2L8ql9— Elyas (@Elyas_Cile) October 14, 2023
“These animals can no longer live.”
Ezra Yachin, a 95-year-old Israeli army reservist, is seen inciting “every Jew with a weapon” to kill Palestinians and “erase the memory of them” pic.twitter.com/LUQs0XoR5U
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) October 13, 2023
A considerable number of infants died in Gaza from either lack of medical resources or food, as the Israeli military besieged hospitals and some citizens kept blocking aid. One of the most horrifying images coming out of Gaza in November 2023 was the decomposed bodies of several premature babies in the Al-Nasser Hospital who died in incubators when the hospital ran out of fuel. When the Israeli army attacked the hospital, they forced the parents to leave these infants behind and then refused to transport them for treatment. Al Nasser, coincidentally, is in the Khan Yunis area of the Gaza Strip, the same place where the soldier in Scooter Braun’s Instagram story said he was stationed.
🚨Shocking scenes from the Intensive Care Unit at Al-Nasser Hospital – #Gaza reveal decomposed bodies of premature babies ❗️
The Israeli army’s refusal to transport them for treatment & forced families to say goodbye, leaving them to slowly die alone ❗️
EVIL EVIL … NO WORDS‼️ pic.twitter.com/JSR0WSkrXF
— Nour Naim| نُور (@NourNaim88) November 28, 2023
A broken hearted mother is photographed staring at her dead baby in Kamal Adwan Hospital in north Gaza. The child, Sahar Al-Zabda, was killed due to the forced malnutrition and starvation that has spread across the north of Gaza. pic.twitter.com/lIdC0CdX78
— Eye on Palestine (@EyeonPalestine) February 29, 2024
5 months after full-scale invasion of📍#Gaza, 30,000 Palestinians are dead, children have died of hunger & +1/2 million people face starvation.
As Israel continues to bomb the besieged Strip & restrict entry of lifesaving aid the @UN struggles to respond.https://t.co/HHQRqWSt84
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) March 9, 2024
With all these points in consideration, fans feel increasingly uncomfortable with Scooter Braun’s association with HYBE artists. Though HYBE dismissed these concerns, calling them Braun’s “personal opinion,” many feel that his amplified visual association with HYBE artists off late makes it impossible for the company to evade responsibility. Braun’s support of Israel also extends beyond social media posts and into the sphere of politics. Hence, the situation is even more pressing for dissenting fans.
Despite the apathy from HYBE and lack of support from their own fandoms, a group of HYBE fans are still pushing for a label-wide boycott until their demands for the company to divest from Zionism are met.
Meanwhile, this wasn’t the first time Braun’s Instagram post received heat from HYBE fans. Previously, he was called out for posting a story deemed Islamophobic and misogynistic. Read more about it here.
Source: Amnesty International
