YouTube is cutting its ties with star video-maker PewDiePieafter criticism of his use of Nazi imagery and antisemitism as props for shock humour.

The video site has cancelled the second season of PewDiePie’s reality show, Scare PewDiePie, and removed his channel from a premium advertising programme following the revelations.

It has also removed advertising from the controversial videos, including one in which he paid two Indian men to pose with a sign that said “death to all Jews”. His 53 million-strong subscriber channel is safe, however, and he will still be able to generate revenue from traditional YouTube display advertising.

The 27-year-old Swede, whose real name is Felix Kjellberg, is one of the most popular performers on the site, with an estimated revue of $14m (£11m) a year from his business empire. But on Monday night he was dropped by his business partner, Disney-owned Maker Studios, after an investigation by the Wall Street Journal tallied nine videos featuring antisemitism or Nazi imagery.

The videos did not directly promote Nazi ideology, instead using the imagery and phrasing of fascism for its shock value alone. Kjellberg says that the video with the banner, for instance, was created to show “how crazy the modern world is”: he had paid the two men to make the sign and video using the freelance marketplace Fiverr.

“I understand that these jokes were ultimately offensive,” he said in a blogpost on Sunday. “As laughable as it is to believe that I might actually endorse these people, to anyone unsure on my standpoint regarding hate-based groups: No, I don’t support these people in any way.”