What were Jeffrey Epstein’s links to Israel? 

The ties between disgraced US financier Jeffrey Epstein and Israel are becoming clearer after the release of millions of documents related to the convicted sex offender by the United States Department of Justice, following a years-long campaign.

The documents have revealed more details of Epstein’s interactions with members of the global elite, including former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. But they also document his funding of Israeli groups, including Friends of the Israeli Defence Forces, and the settler organisation the Jewish National Fund, as well as his ties to members of Israel’s overseas intelligence services.

Ten days since the US Department of Justice last released millions of documents related to Epstein – and ten and a half years since his death in US custody – details of his interactions with other members of the global elite continue to dominate the world’s headlines.

Here’s what we know.

Was Epstein a spy for Israel?

While the documents provide more evidence for those who believe that Epstein was an Israeli intelligence asset, it is still not something we can say for certain.

An FBI memo produced by the bureau’s Los Angeles field office in October 2020 reported that one of its sources had come to believe Epstein “was a co-opted Mossad agent”.

According to the document, the disgraced financier was described as having been “trained as a spy” for Israel’s intelligence service.

The source also claimed Epstein maintained links to US and allied intelligence circles through his longtime lawyer Alan Dershowitz, the Harvard University law professor whose network, it said, included “many students from wealthy families”. Among those cited were Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and envoy, and his brother, Josh Kushner, both described in the memo as former students.

Epstein’s email correspondence also shows him to have had extensive contact with senior Ehud Barak aide and Israeli military intelligence Yoni Koren, who made regular stays at Epstein’s New York residence and whose cancer treatment in 2012, the emails show, Epstein appears to have paid for.

The links to Israel go back much further. Robert Maxwell, a British newspaper tycoon who was the father of Epstein’s former girlfriend and co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, was long rumoured to have been linked to Israeli intelligence.

Maxwell poured money into the Israeli economy and died in mysterious circumstances after he was said to have fallen from his yacht in 1991, after embezzling millions from his company’s pension fund.

Epstein himself appeared to have suspected that the Israeli Mossad intelligence agency had a role in Maxwell’s death. An email Epstein sent in 2018 had the subject line “he was passed away”, referring to Maxwell.

In the message, Epstein claimed that Maxwell had previously threatened Israel’s intelligence service, writing that “unless they [the Mossad] gave him £400 million to save his [Maxwell’s] crumbling empire, he would expose all he had done for them”.

Epstein also alleged that Maxwell had acted as an informal operative, gathering information on the US, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union.

Would Epstein have been of interest to intelligence agencies?

As an international financier with strong ties to global elites, as well as potentially compromising information on them, Epstein is the kind of person intelligence agencies would turn to.

“It is unlikely that Epstein was not approached by the Mossad,” said Ahron Bregman, a lecturer at King’s College London, whose relationship with the alleged Egyptian Mossad agent Ashraf Marwan formed the basis of the book and film The Spy Who Fell to Earth.

“It is like with Ashraf Marwan: even though he was not needed to report on Egypt anymore because there was peace between the two countries, the Mossad renewed contact with him to use him to open doors,” Bregman said.

Dershowitz – himself a controversial figure who is avowedly pro-Israel – has denied the claims, saying of Epstein that “No intelligence agency would really trust him”. Dershowitz added that if Epstein had been an intelligence operative, he would have informed his lawyer – referring to himself.

Israel’s current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also pushed back on claims Epstein was a Mossad agent, writing on Twitter: “Jeffrey Epstein’s unusually close relationship with Ehud Barak doesn’t suggest Epstein worked for Israel. It proves the opposite.”

Barak has long been one of Netanyahu’s political opponents.

Other sources, including Christopher Steele, who used to head up the British spy agency MI6’s Russia desk, have suggested that it was “quite likely” that Epstein may have been “recruited by Russian organised criminals”. Elsewhere, the Polish government has launched an investigation into the late sex offender’s links to Russia’s state intelligence.

Through Epstein’s COUQ Foundation, he provided Friends of the Israeli Defence Forces (FIDF) and the Jewish National Fund (JNF) with funds on at least one occasion, when he gifted $25,000 to the FIDF and $15,000 to the JNF in 2006.

According to the FIDF’s website, the organisation funds programmes for Israeli soldiers. Through its website, the organisation invites donors to adopt a brigade or battalion, such as the 97th Netzah Yehuda Battalion, which has been widely accused of killing unarmed civilians, killing detainees, torture, and mistreatment.

The JNF has also been accused of historically privileging Jewish citizens to land inside Israel while restricting Palestinians’ access under the guise of “environmentalism”.

Activists accuse the JNF of contributing to the displacement of Palestinian communities through forestation projects built over depopulated villages. Its alleged support for settlement activity in the occupied West Bank, principally in the settlement cluster of Gush Etzion, has prompted calls in some countries to revoke its charitable status. The organisation has additionally been challenged over environmental practices seen as damaging to local ecosystems.