A computer game that allows users to recreate aspects of Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel has been removed from the popular gaming platform Steam in the United Kingdom at the request of counterterrorism police, according to emails and the game’s creator.Fursan al-Aqsa: The Knights of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, released in 2022, lets gamers play as the fictional character “Ahmad al-Falastini,” a young Palestinian student, as he takes revenge on Israeli soldiers who tortured him and killed his family.
An updated version of the game called Operation al-Aqsa Flood, the name Hamas uses for its October 7, 2023 attack, was released on Steam earlier this month.
A cut scene for the game shows the main character entering Israel’s Re’im military base via a motorised hang glider, similar to incursions made by Hamas fighters on October 7, while wearing a green scarf around his forehead. Green is the colour of the Hamas flag.
Fighters then attack Israeli soldiers and vehicles and execute a line of unarmed soldiers with shots to the back of the head.
The game’s distributor told developer Nidal Nijm that it had removed the game at the request of UK police, according to emails seen by Al Jazeera.
In an October 24 email, Valve Corporation told Nijm that it had been …
