Newsletter
Newsletter Support JNS

‘New year, new plans,’ says Mehdi Hasan, announcing ‘MSNBC’ departure

The British-American host has been one of Israel’s most vociferous critics on cable television.

Mehdi Hasan, host of MSNBC’s “The Mehdi Hasan Show.” Source: Screenshot.
Mehdi Hasan, host of MSNBC’s “The Mehdi Hasan Show.” Source: Screenshot.

The cable-TV news network MSNBC canceled “The Medi Hasan Show” in November in the early months of Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. As of Sunday, the popular program host has decided to step away from the station.

He announced his plans in a video, saying: “Tonight is not just my final episode of the ‘Mehdi Hasan Show,’ it’s my last day with MSNBC. Yes, I’ve decided to leave.”

The now-former MSNBC contributor has long been a harsh critic of Israel. He has called non-Muslims “animals.”

“You cannot kill your way to victory over a foreign, occupied people,” Hasan wrote on Nov. 9. “My ‘Mehdi Hasan Show’ commentary on how Israel’s killing of innocents in Gaza only strengthens Hamas and its recruiting efforts—as America discovered the hard way in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

“Ever since 9/11, we have just taken it for granted that certain countries can send drones or bombs into foreign sovereign countries, across national borders, to kill people they’ve decided, without an arrest or trial, are guilty of crimes,” Hasan wrote on Jan. 2. “But most other countries can’t do this.”

StopAntisemitism wrote that “Qatari mouthpiece and anti-Israel propaganda machine Mehdi Hasan leaves MSNBC after the network dumps his show.”

Hasan previously worked as an anchor for Al Jazeera and as a podcaster at the left-wing website The Intercept.

“The sense of insecurity experienced by Jewish Canadians is now attracting international attention,” the J7 Large Communities Task Force Against Antisemitism wrote.
Eduardo Martinez “is a flagrant antisemite who used his platform to push hatred and misinformation against our community,” Tali Klima of the Bay Area Jewish Coalition-Action told JNS. “We are not sad to see him go.”
“We will not surrender to a cruel enemy and its collaborators, Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis,” Israel’s consul general in New York said.
“This should not be welcome in the Democratic party,” the New Jersey senator said.
“The outrage only exposes how the press and those poisoned by anti-Israel propaganda will twist anything to blame the Jews,” Lizzy Savetsky told JNS.
Israel said that it “firmly rejects” the charges, which it said targeted the Jewish state “camouflaged as measures against violence.”