Russian propagandists turn their attention to Gaza
Earlier this week, social media influencer and Russian state television’s favorite political commentator Jackson Hinkle celebrated reaching 2.2 million followers on X. He called on his vast audience to subscribe to his X Premium account for $3 to help him “CRUSH ZIONIST LIES!” The California-born Hinkle, only 24, has become a prominent social media presence solely due to his zealous pursuit of untruths.
Since Hamas’s Oct. 7 assault on Israeli civilians, Hinkle has devoted himself to posting anti-Israel content on social media, particularly X. Nearly all of his posts are blatant falsehoods and manipulations. Recently, for instance, he claimed that Israeli authorities staged a scene for Elon Musk, who recently visited the country, with unfired bullets in a crib. It was soon pointed out, however, that the bullets had indeed been fired. Nevertheless, the tweet is still up. Hinkle doesn’t bother with deleting posts or taking them back after errors have been exposed. He just continues to post more — and it works. His audience impressions over the last month alone run into the billions.
Before the Hamas attacks, Hinkle spread Russian propaganda about the war in Ukraine. “Putin has God on his side in his quest to defeat NATO satanists,” Hinkle posted on X back in July. While Hinkle no longer posts about Ukraine, he is still serving Russia’s interests. On Nov. 27, for instance, Hinkle faithfully reported that “Hamas has released a Russian-Israeli citizen as a ‘thank you’ to President Putin for supporting Palestine!” More generally, though, the war in Gaza is an opportunity for Hinkle to do what the Kremlin most wants — focus online attention on the West’s seemingly unreflecting and hypocritical support for Israel.
Hinkle has become a leading figure in that strange, social media-based netherworld of conspiracy theorists who have moved seamlessly from raging (or rather fomenting rage) about Covid vaccines, to raging about U.S. support for Ukraine, to now raging about the war in Gaza.