The New York Times ignores an essential part of the Jeffrey Epstein story — Israel

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The New York Times ignores an essential part of the Jeffrey Epstein story — Israel
Photo released by House Democrats on the Congressional Oversight Committee on December 12, 2025, showing Jeffrey Epstein and Alan Dershowitz. (Photo via House Oversight Democrats)

The New York Times has published a major exposé purporting to explain how Jeffrey Epstein rose to the top of the financial and political world, but it ignores one key topic: Israel.

By Philip Weiss, Reposted from Mondoweiss, December 19, 2025

If you want to understand why conspiracy theories about Jeffrey Epstein flourish, then you must read the interminable investigation the New York Times published, purporting to explain how Jeffrey Epstein clawed himself to the pinnacle of the financial/political/social world. “The Untold Story of How Jeffrey Epstein Got Rich” concludes that Epstein was the greatest conman and swindler that ever lived, and charmed the pants off of every powerful man he met.

Some of his marks still curse Epstein for fleecing them. But the paradigm of the article is the execs at Bear Stearns back in the 70s who found out that the former math teacher at Dalton School had invented college degrees from “two California universities” but didn’t fire him because they wanted to give a humble kid from the outer boros a second chance. 

“You lied about your education,” [senior exec Michael] Tennenbaum said.

“Yes, I know,” Epstein calmly replied. He had never graduated from college. Tennenbaum recalls being disarmed by the admission. Decades later, he would regard it as an example of Epstein’s ability to manipulate his marks — in this case, him.

“Why did you do it?” Tennenbaum stammered.

Without an impressive degree or two, Epstein said, “I knew nobody would give me a chance.”

This resonated with Tennenbaum.

That’s a great story, and there is great reporting in this article. But the premise of the article is a stupid myth the NYT wants to believe– That Epstein was just the canniest, boldest con man that ever lived, and he left everybody swooning. The talented Mr Ripley. 

It’s a myth not because Epstein was not a bold and crafty con man – no doubt he was. But even a conman can have an ethos. Look at Gatsby, a mobster with romance. Look at Trump’s fascistic populism. And Jeffrey Epstein had an ethos that he played on over and over again as his racket grew; and that ethos was the love of Israel in the rising Jewish meritocratic establishment of the 70s. 

Almost every player in the Times story is a Jewish success story who lobbied for Israel in prestigious circles, from Dershowitz to Larry Summers, Leon Black, Lynn Forester de Rothschild, and Epstein’s most famous associations, Robert Maxwell and Les Wexner.  

Love of Israel was a lead criterion for inclusion in Epstein’s circle. I don’t think Epstein’s “marks” were even fooled by him. They knew he was a conman who played fast and loose. But they also knew that the Israel lobby has a need for charmers who break the rules, so they looked the other way.   

Epstein did numerous chores for Israel that investigative sites have documented and the Times does not touch: he helped Israel broker financial deals with neighbors, he had an Israeli spy living in his house for a time, and he had a close relationship with former Israeli PM Ehud Barak that included business ventures and politics in Israel.

“It’s well past time to ask questions about the billionaire pedophile’s links to Israel,” Jacobin says. 

Epstein held multiple passports, including one from Austria with a false name and an address in Saudi Arabia.  

Some theorize that Epstein was Mossad and running a “honeytrap” for the Israeli government, videotaping pols having sex so they could be blackmailed to support Israel. I don’t see the evidence for this. However, the evidence in plain sight suggests that Epstein was always willing to help Israel whenever possible, and this service ultimately elevated him. 

As the Times says, in its one reference to Israel: “In 1989, Epstein accompanied Wayne Owens, a Democratic congressman from Utah, on a trip to the Middle East to explore ways to promote business ties between Israel and its neighbors.” That trip came about because of Epstein’s relationship to the Israel-supporter Les Wexner. But the Times studiously avoids the Israel connection when it comes to the two people Epstein was closest to, businessman Wexner and fellow child sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. 

To show you how foolish the Times narrative is, let’s focus on those relationships.  

Maxwell says she met Epstein in 1990 or 1991 when she was 30 and had come to New York from England as an ambassador for her beloved father’s growing media empire in the States. A friend introduced her, she says, and she remembers Epstein, then in his late 30s, having a ketchup stain on his tie.  

Maxwell’s father then vetted Epstein by calling Bear Stearns execs. Here’s the Times version: 

“When the domineering Robert Maxwell learned that his daughter was spending time with Epstein, he contacted Ace Greenberg and Jimmy Cayne, both of whom he was close to, to see what they knew about their former Bear Stearns employee. Greenberg and Cayne apparently vouched for Epstein.”

Ghislaine explained the vetting in her deposition to the Justice Department last summer. Her father was extremely protective of her because he was such a controversial figure that she had been threatened, including a death threat by the Irish Republican Army. So he wanted to get her a bodyguard (she turned him down) and to know who she was dating. And Bear Stearns was “one of our banks.”  

Let’s take Ghislaine at her word…

What doesn’t track in the Times story is the idea that Cayne and Greenberg would “vouch” for Epstein. Wait a second. The Times just recounted one incident after another in Epstein’s career in his 20s and 30s where he ripped people off, lied to them, smiles and waves. Cayne and Greenberg knew this well. They’d fired Epstein after an SEC investigation of trading violations 10 years earlier! They knew Epstein to be a charming fraud who invented his degrees. 

So when their friend and client Robert Maxwell, who is one of the biggest businessmen in the world, calls them to get their take on Epstein as boyfriend material for his beloved daughter — they “vouch” for him. No red flags?? 

I think the truth is that everybody knew this guy was a conman, and Ghislaine wasn’t really his girlfriend, but a consort; it was a business relationship from the start (she claims he was actually dating Eva Andersson until 1994). And in fact, the Bear Stearns execs were vouching for Epstein as a Jewish kid on the make who loved what Robert Maxwell loved — Israel. 

Robert Maxwell was born in Czechoslovakia and lost much of his family in the Holocaust. As Ghislaine Maxwell stated in her deposition to the Justice Department last summer, her father served as an intelligence officer in World War II and essentially functioned as one throughout his life, passing on secrets to governments, including Israel.

There is speculation that Maxwell worked for Mossad. After his death by drowning in 1991, Maxwell was given what the press termed a state funeral in Israel, and then was buried in Jerusalem. 

“My father, you know, anything that touches on Israel or the state of Israel, I’m always interested in because my father loved Israel and so I pay attention to it and we have ties to Israel,” Maxwell said.  

Jimmy Cayne also loved Israel; he gave to many causes there. Ace Greenberg gave half his philanthropy to Jewish causes and Israel.

The Times also whitewashes the relationship with Les Wexner, the man who truly elevated Epstein. This is how the Times subtitles their association: “A confidence man meets his most significant mark”

So Les Wexner is a mark? But according to the Times, Wexner’s people saw through Epstein from the start. And Wexner just “didn’t listen” again and again. 

[Harold] Levin told us that he spent an hour with Epstein in his office and immediately got a bad vibe. He found a pay phone and called Wexner. “I smell a rat,” Levin reported. “I don’t trust him.”

Wexner apparently didn’t listen…

Almost immediately, Wexner’s colleagues grew alarmed by his embrace of Epstein. “I tried to find out how did he get from a high school math teacher to a private investment adviser,” the vice chairman of the Limited told The New York Times in 2019….

Once again, Wexner didn’t listen, and thus became the most important contributor to the staggering growth in Epstein’s fortune. One unsolved mystery of the Epstein era is what exactly Wexner got out of their relationship.

Wexner didn’t listen because he didn’t want to listen. As to what he got out of the relationship—well, Wexner cares deeply about Israel. Wexner is married to an Israeli-American, Abigail Koppel, whose father fought in Israel’s foundational war and later opened El Al Airlines in the U.S. Per the latest emails, Koppel and Epstein were close. When her father died in 2006—“In lieu of flowers, the family requests that contributions be made to ‘Friends of the Israel Defense Forces,’”

Wexner is a pillar of the Israel lobby. Just last month at the Jewish Federations conference, Eric Fingerhut, a former Congress member, hailed Wexner as one of those great Jewish leaders who love Israel and combine communal leadership with the ability to stand next to the governor and the mayor. 

Yes, and right after he got in with Wexner, Epstein flew out to Israel with a Utah congressman to promote business deals. 

Once you start connecting Israel dots with Epstein, you can’t stop…. Epstein worked with Dershowitz to try to discredit the authors of the bombshell Israel lobby paper in 2006. 

Epstein’s close associate Leon Black (who was brought down by their association in 2021) gave $1 million to the Birthright program and a large gift to the Israeli defense forces. 

The one time I met Epstein (reporting for this article) he was with Howard Rubenstein, the p.r. guy who was a devoted supporter of Israel. 

You simply cannot separate the shared love of Israel from Epstein’s mysterious rise. The Times investigation is naïve and stupid. No wonder people turn to Tucker Carlson. 

RELATED…38 YEARS AGO…

Contra Diversion Plan Originated with Israeli, Senate Committee Told

By Walter Pincus and David Hoffman
 

The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has been told that the first suggestion to divert money from the Iran arms sales to aid the Nicaraguan rebels was made by an emissary from then-Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres during a meeting last January with White House aides, according to sources who have read a draft report on the committee’s investigation.

Sources yesterday said the emissary apparently was Amiran Nir, then newly appointed special assistant to Peres for counterterrorism, who had come to Washington to persuade the administration to resume arms sales to Iran. He met with then-National Security Adviser Vice Adm. John M. Poindexter and one of his deputies, Lt. Col. Oliver L. North.

According to the Senate committee report, North later recounted to Attorney General Edwin Meese III how an Israeli, which the committee believes was Nir, suggested at this meeting that money from the arms sales be used to help the Nicaraguan contras, or counterrevolutionaries, the sources said. One source said that North told Meese that since the money came from Iran and was not U.S. or Israeli funds, the proposal seemed legitimate. Meese, who confronted North about the diversion Nov. 23, later testified to the Senate panel in closed session about North’s explanation.

There has been dispute over the origin of the idea to resume the shipments of U.S. arms to Iran, which had been temporarily halted in late 1985 after several shipments from Israeli stocks, and the subsequent plan to divert money to aid the contras. But the Senate report and a memorandum prepared for President Reagan by Poindexter last January appear to reinforce claims by some top officials that the Israelis played an active role in encouraging the United States to enter into the Iran-contra scheme.

The first proposal to ship U.S. arms to Iran to open contacts and win freedom for American hostages in Lebanon came in July 1985 from David Kimche, a senior Israeli official, who approached then-National Security Adviser Robert C. McFarlane, according to McFarlane’s testimony to Congress. The Israelis shipped weapons to Iran in September 1985, followed by the release of the Rev. Benjamin Weir; another shipment was made in November.

Senior Israeli officials, including Peres, now the foreign minister, have stated that they acted only at the behest of the United States, and have denied originating the idea of diverting funds to the contras. Peres in Rome yesterday said Israel supplied the U.S.-made arms to Tehran as “a symbolic and strategic gesture,” which was made under no pressure from Washington.

But the Poindexter memo, which the White House made public yesterday, makes repeated references to an “Israeli” plan. It says that the Israelis feared Iran’s military position in the war with Iraq was deteriorating, and if Iran was defeated it would result in enhanced Soviet influence in the Persian Gulf area.

“The Israelis are convinced that the Iranians are so desperate for military material, expertise and intelligence,” that providing arms would result in “favorable long-term changes in personnel and attitudes within the Iranian government,” the memo says.

The memo adds that the Israelis proposed unilaterally selling weapons to “Western-oriented Iranian factions,” as long as the United States would provide assurances they could repurchase U.S. replenishments for what they sold. However, the memo says, Poindexter recommended against this because the law requires notification of such arms transfers.

Instead, Poindexter said there is “another possiblity.” He said former attorney general William French Smith, who left the government in 1984, had determined that under some kinds of intelligence “findings,” the president could “authorize the CIA to sell arms to countries outside of the provisions of the laws and reporting requirements.” Poindexter said the plan called for the Central Intelligence Agency to purchase arms from the Pentagon and transfer them to Iran directly after receiving payment.

Poindexter did not identify the circumstances in which Smith had provided this legal opinion. A Justice Department source said yesterday that Smith’s advice was sent in a 1981 letter to the CIA and was based on advice from the State Department. Smith said yesterday the opinion was used in a “substantially different context” and did not involve Iran. He also refused to say what the circumstance was because “it’s all highly classified.”

The Poindexter memo was written to explain to Reagan the reasons for signing the Jan. 17, 1986, intelligence “finding” that authorized a resumption of the arms sales. It includes a written notation by Poindexter that he briefed Reagan on the contents in the presence of Vice President Bush, White House chief of staff Donald T. Regan and the late Donald Fortier, Poindexter’s deputy. Poindexter initialed the memo for Reagan, writing “RR per JP” under the “OK” recommendation.

There were these other disclosures yesterday:Sources familiar with the Senate report said the Jan. 2, 1986, Nir meeting with North and Poindexter triggered a series of events in which a draft intelligence finding for the president was prepared, and a full-scale National Security Council meeting held on Jan. 7.

At the meeting, Reagan’s advisers were sharply divided. The draft finding is dated Jan. 6 and was signed by the president, but officials have said they do not know when he signed it. The draft finding was identical to one Reagan signed Jan. 17, except the second finding added language to indicate that “third parties,” apparently meaning individuals, would be involved in the arms deals.

A White House official who has reviewed most of the documents said Poindexter decided not to inform Secretary of State George P. Shultz about the president’s approval of the Jan. 17 intelligence finding. Shultz opposed the plan, but official procedures required that he be informed of such a finding. Shultz has told the House Foreign Affairs Committee he did not learn of the finding until November 1986.

The Senate report says that Shultz told colleagues immediately after the Jan. 7 meeting that he realized his objections would not stop the arms sales from going ahead. The backround paper released yesterday discloses that William J. Casey, director of central intelligence, and Meese supported the Iran policy. While Shultz and Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger opposed it, Casey and Meese “believed the short-term and long-term objectives of the plan warrant the policy risks involved.”

Previously, Meese’s position was described as providing legal advice that the finding was proper, and Casey’s position was described as ambiguous. On Saturday, Jan. 18, one day after the president signed the finding, Weinberger received an “urgent” phone call from the White House instructing him to arrange for the Pentagon to transfer up to 4,000 TOW antitank missiles to the CIA for a covert action, according to congressional sources. The urgency of the call suggested that White House officials anticipated a quick deal in which the hostages would be released upon shipment of the first 1,000 missiles.

The Senate report suggests that Poindexter envisioned a single culminating deal — all the hostages for the first batch of missiles, but others, including North, apparently were more realistic about prospects.

Weinberger bypassed the normal channels used for covert shipments and had his senior military assistant, Lt. Gen. Colin L. Powell, handle arrangements. Powell is slated to be the new deputy national security adviser.

The first shipment of 1,000 TOWs went in February with North believing that Iran would send at least some of these to the Afghanistan rebels, according to the Senate report.

However, it could not be established by the Senate panel whether the missiles were received. Furthermore, no hostages were released. According to the Senate report, in early March 1986, a meeting was held in Europe with Nir, North and others, including Manucher Ghorbanifar, the Iran arms dealer who was acting as a middleman, and George Cave, a former CIA agent.

Subsequently, Cave reported to Casey that Ghorbanifar had suggested overcharging the Iranians Senior Israeli officials have stated that they acted only at the behest of the United States.

and diverting money to the contras and the Afghan resistance. Ghorbanifar’s suggestion was the last line in a long cable to Casey from Cave, and was the first hint of a possible diversion. Casey did not respond to the message.

The CIA issued a statement yesterday which said that Casey, now recovering from brain surgery, “testified under oath before four congressional committees that he did not learn that monies may have been diverted to the contras until the White House so informed him just before Attorney General Meese held his press conference on 25 November.”

“No credible evidence of a diversion of monies ever came to the attention of the agency. Most importantly, there is no indication whatsoever that CIA was involved in any diversion of funds, that CIA misused its funds or violated any law,” the statement said.

Last January, Nir visited Washington after meeting with Saudi tycoon Adnan Khashoggi and Ghorbanifar, both of whom had been involved in the 1985 Israeli shipments which had resulted in the freeing of Weir.

At this point, Nir supplanted Kimche as the chief Israeli contact on the operation, according to the Senate report. The January visited occurred during a difficult period in Israeli-U.S. relations, since Israeli spy Jonathan J. Pollard had recently been arrested in Washington.

In his discussion with Meese, North did not say which Israelis were involved, but the panel and other sources believe it was Nir, who was specifically named as North’s usual contact.

Nir also traveled with North and McFarlane on the mission to Tehran in May 1986. He took part in discussions there over the hostages and weapons, talks which broke up when the Iranians refused to help in the release of any more hostages without additional shipments.

Nir also briefed Bush at North’s behest in July.

According to the Senate report, North told Meese that the Israelis proposed three options. One was to use Israel as a conduit for money to the contras. The second was to use Israeli money. The third was to overcharge the Iranians and use the money for the contras, which North said was the plan ultimately adopted. Staff writer Mary Thornton contributed to this report. 

Philip Weiss is an American journalist who co-edits Mondoweiss (“a news website devoted to covering American foreign policy in the Middle East, chiefly from a progressive Jewish perspective”) with journalist Adam Horowitz. Weiss describes himself as an anti-Zionist and rejects the label “post-Zionist.”

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