Facebook pages belonging to the controversial far-right activist Avi Yemini have been removed from the platform, following Gizmodo’s enquiries.
On Tuesday, Yemini tweeted that a Facebook page belonging to him, The Yemini Report, had been unpublished. The page had more than 33,000 likes at the time.
After Gizmodo contacted Facebook about whether Yemini — whose Facebook page had been previously banned by Facebook — was breaking the rules with his new page, the company confirmed that they had banned Yemini’s new page.
This comes only days after another one of his ‘Avi Yemini’ Facebook pages, which had more than 77,000 followers, was banned, too.
also speaking of Avi Yemini, his Facebook Page got deleted off Facebook again. pic.twitter.com/xi6iK4jPqd
— CMWLSN (@cameronwilson) September 17, 2020
Who is Avi Yemini and why is he banned from Facebook?
Yemini is a far-right YouTuber who once called himself “the world’s proudest Jewish Nazi” and has links to Australian Neo-Nazis, according to Australian Jewish Democratic Society.
Yemini made a name for himself attacking Islam, China, and most recently, Victoria’s lockdown on his YouTube channel (which has more than 426,000 subscribers).
In 2018, Yemini’s main Facebook page was banned by Facebook. BuzzFeed reported at the time it was due to repeated examples of hate speech.
The ban followed Yemini publishing the phone number of Australian journalist Osman Faruqi after he tweeted about the plastic bag ban. Faruqi was subsequently inundated with death threats and said he was “scared for his safety.”
In 2019, Yemini plead guilty to unlawful assault against his then-wife, admitting to throwing a chopping board which hit her on the head.
Despite his controversial past and strong views, Yemini has been repeatedly amplified by media outlets and politicians. He is trying to rebrand as a journalist, and has recently been named as Chief Australian Correspondent for Rebel Media, a Canadian alt-right website which has promoted climate change and anti-Islamic conspiracy theories.
Avi Yemini is suing Victoria Police after he was arrested while filming a video at anti-lockdown protests earlier this month.
Yemini also has links to the Australian Liberty Alliance, a political party that changed its name to Yellow Vest Australia before being deregistered in September. Yemini stood in the 2018 Victorian state election as a candidate for the party, but was unsuccessful with 0.48% of the vote.
The Australian Liberty Alliance Facebook page — which almost exclusively posts content from Yemini — remains published.
But the latest decision by Facebook to keep him off the platform will limit Yemini’s reach on the platform.