WASHINGTON – YouTube announced on Wednesday that it had terminated the channel of a pro-Iranian group that produced a viral Lego-themed AI video mocking U.S. President Donald Trump, sparking criticism online.
Explosive Media, a pro-Tehran creative group that claims to be independent but is widely suspected of having ties to the Iranian government, gained internet notoriety during the US-Iran war with animated videos that racked up millions of views.
“We have terminated the channel for violating our spam, deceptive and fraudulent behavior policies,” a YouTube spokesperson told AFP, without providing further details.
It added that the channel was suspended on March 27.
Explosive Media still posted videos mocking the U.S. war effort on other technology platforms, including Elon Musk-owned X and Telegram.
According to US media, Instagram, which is owned by Mehta, also deleted the group’s account, but another account with the same name was still active as of Wednesday.
Mehta did not respond to AFP’s request for comment.
Explosive Media slammed YouTube, writing about X, “Seriously! Is Lego-style animation actually violent?”
widely shared
YouTube’s outage appears to have had a limited impact on Explosive Media’s reach, with its videos still being widely shared by content creators on the platform.
The satirical video, which draws on American popular culture, caricatures President Trump with his oversized yellow head, portraying him as an old, isolated figure who seems disconnected from reality and prone to childish tantrums.
After the two-week ceasefire was announced last week, the group posted a video to X with the caption “TACO will always be TACO,” referencing the acronym for “Trump Always Chickens Out.”
With dramatic background music, the video shows Trump-like toy figures swarming Arab leaders, hurling chairs at U.S. military personnel, and Iranian generals pressing a red button that says “Back to the Stone Age”, unleashing a torrent of destruction across the Middle East.
Cartoon-style video memes, amplified by Iranian diplomatic missions and pro-Iranian accounts on social media, have emerged as an effective information warfare tool, a phenomenon analysts have dubbed the “legitimization” of conflict propaganda.
In recent weeks, viral meme videos have depicted a hypothetical Iranian military victory, world leaders reduced to a subservient scenario dependent on Iranian leaders for oil, and even the strategic Strait of Hormuz reimagined as a cartoonish tollbooth.
Explosive Media’s English content appears to be aimed at an audience outside Iran, where platforms like X have been blocked for years and can only be accessed via VPN.
Explosive Media’s ability to produce and upload sophisticated content has heightened suspicions of ties to the Iranian regime as Iranians face what monitor Netblox calls an “internet blackout.”
The group rejected the claims as “media distortion.” – Anuj Chopra/AFP
