Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett dismissed allegations that convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein worked for Israeli intelligence services, describing the claims from U.S. media figures as being part of “a vicious wave of slander and lies” against Israel.
The Israeli politician on Monday said he had “100% certainty” that Epstein did not have any ties to the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence agency, or the country itself.
“The accusation that Jeffrey Epstein somehow worked for Israel or the Mossad running a blackmail ring is categorically and totally false,” Bennett said in a post on X. “There’s a vicious wave of slander and lies against my country and my people, and we just won’t take it anymore.”
The denial comes after right-wing commentator and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson suggested on Friday without evidence that Epstein was likely working for the Israeli government. Similar claims have been levied by others in the past but have not been proven.
Epstein recently returned to national headlines after the Justice Department released a memo earlier this month denying that any evidence supports the existence of an Epstein “client list” or that the disgraced financier was murdered. The memo has caused a rift between President Donald Trump and his MAGA base, who have long promoted conspiracy theories tied to Epstein and his 2019 death behind bars. Trump previously promised during his 2024 campaign that he would release records about Epstein if he won the election, but since the memo’s release has urged his supporters to move on.
Read more: Trump Urges Supporters to Move On From Epstein, as MAGA Conspiracists Demand Transparency
Bennett accused Carlson and other “prominent online personalities” of “pretending they know things they don’t,” adding, “They just make things up, say it with confidence and these lies stick, because it’s Israel.”
Here’s what to know about the allegations.
Why is Naftali Bennett publicly addressing these allegations now?
Bennett’s public address follows Carlson’s comments alleging a connection between Israel and Epstein during a Turning Point USA Student Action Summit on Friday. The popular conservative commentator, who has been one of the most prominent critics of the Justice Department’s memo, said that people needed to start questioning “why was [Epstein] doing this, on whose behalf, and where was the money coming from?”
Epstein, Carlson went on to speculate, was working on behalf of intelligence services, likely for a foreign government. “Now, no one’s allowed to say that foreign government is Israel, because we’ve been somehow cowed into thinking that that’s naughty,” he added. “There is nothing wrong with saying that, there’s nothing hateful about saying that, there’s nothing antisemitic about saying that—there’s nothing even anti-Israel about saying that!”
The history behind the allegations that Epstein was connected to Mossad
The allegations that Epstein had ties to Israeli intelligence services are not new.
Miami Herald investigative journalist Julie K. Brown, best known for her investigations into Epstein, told The Times of Israel in 2021 that there was a possible connection between the convicted sex offender and the Israeli intelligence community due to his relationship with media baron Robert Maxwell.
“Robert Maxwell certainly had those kinds of connections, and Epstein had a close relationship with Robert Maxwell,” Brown, who is also the author of Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story, told the publication.
Rumors about a connection between Epstein and Mossad have also been brought forward by Epstein’s former girlfriend and victim, known in court documents as Jane Doe 200, against the disgraced financier’s estate. The woman claimed in a legal filing that she was told that Robert Maxwell was in the Mossad, and was “led to believe by both Maxwell and Epstein that Epstein was as well.”
In response to Bennett’s defense, which she called “meaningless,” longtime conservative commentator Megyn Kelly also cited 2019 reports that claimed that Alexander Acosta, the former Miami attorney who gave Epstein a controversial non-prosecution plea deal in 2008, had told the Trump transition team that Epstein “belonged to intelligence.” Acosta later denied such reports.
Read more: The Biggest Names from Jeffrey Epstein’s Unsealed Court Documents
In his Friday comments, Carlson pointed to Epstein’s reported ties to Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, with whom the convicted sex offender allegedly met some 30 times from 2013 to 2017.
Carlson questioned why Epstein had never been asked about a connection with Barak or Mossad. “What the hell is this? You have the former Israeli prime minister living in your house, you have had all this contact with a foreign government, were you working on behalf of the Mossad? Were you running a blackmail operation on behalf of a foreign government?” the right-wing media personality asked.
Other prominent political leaders, including Trump and former President Bill Clinton, have also been named in court documents released in connection with Epstein.