WASHINGTON – Jason Epstein travels internationally as a public affairs consultant, and although he is a proud Jew, he does not announce it in countries where that might be an issue.
Until now it hasn’t been a problem, he says: Last names immediately recognizable as Jewish in the West are not identified as such in much of the rest of the world.
Lately, though, his Jewishness is coming up, he says, and he suspects it’s because antisemitic conspiracy theories have resurged alongside renewed attention to Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender at the center of one the United States’ strangest and most divisive political issues.
“You do have to wonder whether your last name might be the same as wearing a kippah,” he said.
Just as kippah-wearing Jews have experienced attacks from both right-wing and left-wing antisemites, so too are extremists on both the left and the right spreading antisemitic conspiracy theories about Epstein, a spokesperson for the Anti-Defamation League told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, who noted that Epstein’s crimes and alleged crimes had nothing to do with his Jewish identity.
“The ADL Center on Extremism has tracked a demonstrable increase in rhetoric that promotes antisemitic and anti-Israel conspiracy theories about Jeffrey Epstein in recent weeks, many of which attribute Epstein’s deplorable crimes to a supposed covert Israeli operation run by Mossad,” the spokesperson said.
Five years after he was found hanged in his prison cell, Epstein is in the headlines because the Trump administration has flip-flopped on meeting a key demand of President Donald Trump’s MAGA base, to release all the files in a bid to expose whomever else joined Epstein in his criminal activity.
President Donald Trump, who was a close friend to Epstein from the late 1980s to 2004, is known to be named in the files. Trump has urged his followers to leave the case alone, calling it a conspiracy theory concocted by Democrats.
The scandal won’t die: Democrats and some Republicans want the files released, and some in Trump’s base, for the first time since his meteoric political rise in the middle of the last decade, are turning on him.
“It’s just a red line that it crosses for many people,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican long known for her fealty to Trump, told CNN last month. “It has been a very serious situation for the administration.”
Amid the surging interest, antisemitic conspiracy theories about Epstein appear to be moving off the fringes, the ADL spokesperson said.
“This rhetoric has surged in recent weeks across the political spectrum, on both fringe and mainstream social media, streaming platforms and shows,” the spokesperson said.
The mainstreaming of Epstein conspiracies poses risks to American Jews, said Joshua Shanes, a professor of Jewish history at the University of California, Davis and a member of a task force at the Nexus Project, an organization that tracks antisemitism.
“Whenever you have this notion of collectivizing all Jews as this global nefarious force, that’s the most dangerous thing,” Shanes said. “It’s not about Israel, per se. It’s about this global Jewish conspiracy. And that is deadly, literally deadly,” he said, noting the conspiracy theories that have in recent years fueled deadly attacks.
Ari Ben Menashe, a onetime Israeli operative whom Israeli and American officials have said is a fabulist who vastly exaggerates and fabricates, claims to have run Epstein as an asset. There is otherwise no substantial evidence of any ties between Epstein and Israeli intelligence.
Allegations that Epstein has ties to the Mossad have circulated for years based on an array of disparate connections: The fact that he was Jewish, his longtime financial relationship and friendship with Les Wexner, the fashion magnate known for his Jewish philanthropy, his visits to Israel among many other countries, his friendship with former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, one of many notable figures in the United States, Britain and elsewhere who hobnobbed with Epstein when he was an investor and a philanthropist.
The conspiracists also make an issue of Epstein’s sex trafficking coconspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell, currently serving time in a federal position, being the daughter of Robert Maxwell, the scandal-plagued Jewish British media magnate who ran guns to Israel during its independence war.
The elder Maxwell died before Ghislaine Maxwell met Epstein.
The same extremists, ranging from Max Blumenthal on the left to Candace Owens on the right, have ramped up the conspiracy-mongering now that Epstein is in the headlines again.
Amy Spitalnick, the CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said the conspiracy mongering embodied the “horseshoe” model of extremists on both sides of the spectrum inspiring and spurring one another.
“There are those on the far right, like Tucker Carlson and others who are using this to advance antisemitic and other extremist conspiracy theories related to Mossad, related to broader issues,” she said. “And there are those on the far left who are eager to jump on them because it validates their own worldview. And so understanding the ways in which this looks like a horseshoe right now is important.”
The conspiracy theories have gotten widespread airplay in recent weeks. Tucker Carlson, the massively influential podcaster, aired the conspiracy theory at a conference of Turning Point, the youth wing of the MAGA movement. He got huge cheers when he named Israel as Epstein’s employer.
Carlson’s conspiracy mongering drew a rebuke from Naftali Bennett, the former Israeli prime minister. “Epstein’s conduct, both the criminal and the merely despicable, had nothing whatsoever to do with the Mossad or the State of Israel,” he said, singling out Carlson for criticism. ”Epstein never worked for the Mossad.” Bennett’s statement appears to be the most sweeping Israeli repudiation of any Mossad-Epstein ties.
Carlson, who has platformed antisemites on his programming, is known to be a critic of the U.S.-Israel relationship. His former colleague at Fox News, Megyn Kelly, who like Carlson has a massive online following, is known for her pro-Israel sympathies – but she too has flirted the Mossad conspiracy theory.
“Where’d he get all that money?” Kelly said after airing Carlson’s claims Epstein was employed by the Mossad, in a contentious interview last month on her online show with the Jewish online media magnate, Ben Shapiro, who was on the show to debate Kelly on whether the current Epstein scandal merited the attention it was receiving.
Shapiro said that the Israel connection was dubious, especially since Israel has sworn off running American Jews as spies in the wake of the catastrophic Jonathan Pollard espionage case in 1986. “Israel really wants to steer clear of pissing off the United States,” he said.
Ross Douthat, the conservative columnist at The New York Times who is also known for his pro-Israel positions, bought into some of the conspiracy theories in an interview with the Miami Herald journalist who has led reporting on Epstein, Julie K. Brown. “So this is a world of people who overlap with Israeli intelligence, and maybe Epstein is useful as a conduit of information,” he said.
Now the threat of the mainstreaming of the conspiracy theories could make it into congressional hearings on the Epstein files. On X, Greene used a term often associated with Jewish nefariousness, “elite evil cabals,” in calling for the release of the Epstein files. “Is there a blackmail list and are there foreign countries’ governments involved?” she told CNN.
Top congressional Democrats are leading the charge for the files’ release, seeing an opening to wound Trump early in his second term.
Shanes, the professor of Jewish history, said the pursuit was legitimate, but lawmakers should take care to vociferously denounce conspiracy-mongering.
“If someone is getting out there and in the news cycle and saying, ‘Show us the file, Epstein, Epstein, Epstein,’ they should be very careful at any opportunity that they see a hint of conspiracy thinking about Jews or Israel to clarify, ‘well, that’s ridiculous. That’s an antisemitic theory, that’s the basis of modern Jew hatred,” he said.
Halie Soifer, the CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said it was up to Trump to forcefully denounce the antisemitic undercurrents of the conspiracy theories, if only because he has elevated so many baseless conspiracy theories himself.
“He’s never done anything to send a signal to conspiracy theorists that this form of hatred that we see so integral to his conspiracy theories is unacceptable,” she said.
Spitalnick said journalists, academics, politicians and other public figures should in every instance of mentioning the Epstein case emphasize that the Israel- and Jewish-related conspiracy theories are baseless.
“You overtly name the fact that there are those exploiting us to normalize and advance antisemitic and other extremist conspiracy theories, and differentiate between the facts and those conspiracy theories.”
The ADL official agreed, saying that it was especially critical to rebuff antisemitic conspiracies as their penetration has metastasized since Hamas launched a war on Israel.
“We’ve observed and tracked an explosion of antisemitic rhetoric in the nearly two years since Oct. 7, 2023, including a considerable number of conspiracy theories and rampant online hate and harassment against Jews.” the spokesperson said. “The surge in Epstein conspiracy theories today feed on many other conspiracies and on this disturbingly normalized antisemitism. Lawmakers and public figures must avoid conspiracy mongering and unsupported speculation about Epstein, his motives, and associates.”
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