Candace Owens on Jeffrey Epstein
Believing that Epstein was colluding with the Mossad to produce blackmail on politicians and other celebrities (discussed, e.g., in Tucker Carlson’s interview with Candace Owens) is now officially an “anti-Semitic conspiracy theory” according to JTA: Antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jeffrey Epstein are proliferating — and going mainstream
Well, that would definitely include Candace Owens, as recorded in her interview with Tucker Carlson:
I would say Israel, obviously. And again, I’m so tired of us being gaslit, the dumbest gaslighting of all time. On record, okay, when Pam Bondi said, I just, I can’t even, this was just a moment where I was like, okay like, F you, you guys hate us. Like, you just like, you don’t even, you have so much power. Why don’t you just come out and say, Nana boo boo, you can’t touch us, F. You. I would rather you do that, right? Then put on this pretense of a [press] conference, and then you’ve got Trump over here, being like, “does anybody still care about Jeffrey Epstein?” And then Pam Bondi has asked the question, was he working for another country? And she says, we don’t know, right. You don’t know? So in my series, I’m like, maybe we can help them. Maybe we can the deep state figure out who Jeffrey Epstein was working for. Here is Ari Ben-Manash. Who was a Mossad agent who is on record, literally recorded. Let’s listen to him tell us about how Jeffrey Epstein was working for the Mossad. Okay, Ari Ben-Manash worked for Mossad and he’s saying that Robert Maxwell brought him to Jeffrey Epstein and said, let this guy in. He’s gonna be involved in weapons. Hey, Pam Bondi, you might’ve missed this one. Okay, you may have missed this. Then you go to another person who is on record who is Victor Ostrofsky, who defected from the Mossad notoriously. The Mossad admits he worked for the Massad. He wrote a book? By Way of Deception. He says that’s the Mossad motto, which they obviously do that. That’s why they, you know, execute all these false flags. And he told everybody the truth. He has said, Jeffrey Epstein was working with us. So for whatever reason, Candice Owens is able to determine whether or not Jeffrey Epsteen might have been working for other state, but Pam Bondi, they’re just gonna have to keep surmising about whether or not Jeffrey Epstein, who with Ghislaine Maxwell, her father being Robert Maxwell, one of the biggest lies, by the way, that’s that’s told and I debunked this in our first or third Epstein episode, is the idea that, oh, well, yeah, Robert Maxwell. They admit he was a Mossad agent, but Epstein didn’t know him. The story they try to tell now in fashion to the public is like Ghislaine and Jeffrey Epstein met after her dad was dead. That’s just false. Again, Ari Ben-Manash tells a story of being brought into the office and being told that Epstein was going to be brought in. This was the Iran-Contra scandal. So since the 80s, Jeffrey Epstein has been working for Israel. I don’t know how I know that and Trump and Pam Bondi don’t, but they got to bring me in. Like I might have some evidence here, right? It’s like, so it’s, we’re getting to a point now.
Tucker [01:42:54] You’re going to have tough confirmation hearing.
Candace Owens [01:42:56] I’m just I just want them to say F you like seriously. That would feel better at this point if they just came out and said F you now that a boo boo you can’t touch us. We rule over you. Ha ha. That would feel at least authentic going back to the Taylor runs thing. You know, I’d be like, I really don’t like that, but at least it’s authentic and I know you mean it and it’s true.
Tucker [01:43:20] All totally fair, does, does any of, I mean, to the extent that we can project forward and guess, does does any this come out? I mean to a greater extent than it has. I mean do, is there ever like a public resolution of this story?
Candace Owens [01:43:32] No, because Israel’s controlling our government. So no, the answer is no. Trump is powerless against them. We haven’t had, I don’t think we’ve been a sovereign nation since they shot JFK. And when I say they, it’s like people online say, what do you mean by they? I’m talking about Israel. I don’t want you guys to like, you know, read in between, I’m talking about Israel, so like, let’s stop making that a taboo subject, because… They’ve gone mask down. Everything they’re doing is demonic. I want nothing to do with it. I will never support Israel into the future after what they’ve done to these children. The starvation campaign. I don’t care. Please write your article. You’ve already written them all. I don’t know what you could add about me, but I do not support Israel. And I don’t think that Jewish Americans should support Israel, and I hope that they’re now having those conversations. I see many of them recognizing that they have been propagandized into believing they have to support this demonic state. And that’s in large part thanks to their birthright trip. Yeah, that mask down moment for Jonathan Greenblatt of the ADL when he got caught on the hot mic, it was released. He didn’t know he was being recorded. And he’s like saying that they’ve got to get TikTok under control because we have a generational issue with TikTok. We need to do something about this like what we did with Birthright. What does that tell you? That the entire purpose of that Birthright trip, telling every Jewish American, you forget a free trip to Israel. Was to propagandize you into believing that you have some affinity with this made up country in the Middle East in 1948. That you have to react when something’s happening to them or you have look away when they’re doing things that are so obviously wrong and demonic. And so I’m hoping now that we’re getting to that point where people can recognize that whether you’re black, you don’t have to agree with BLM, whether you, allowing your identity to shape your morality is problematic, okay? And Israel, in and of itself. Is the demonic nation. I will never support Israel, right? So I went from working for PragerU to I will never support israel in. So that’s how much the scales have fallen from my eyes about what they are involved in. And if this isn’t your wake up call to just look at the footage of what they’re doing, they’re playing hunger games and like throwing food at them and then killing people and seeing who survives. You I mean, it’s just at your fingertips. You have to take a look at what Israel is doing.
JTA on the “Anti-Semitic Conspiracy Theory”:
Watchdogs point to the Epstein discourse as a textbook example of “horseshoe theory”: where the far ends of the political spectrum come together.
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.”
Sunday saw another night of protests outside the Bell Hotel in Epping. Essex police were eager to clamp down on the subsequent demonstrations, arresting a total of six people and describing the atmosphere as “angry and violent”. Locals had for years expressed frustration at the area being used to house asylum seekers, a feeling which overflowed last week.
This is not the first time protesters have clashed with police over the Government’s decision to place those who cross the Channel in hotels. But the events of the past week should suggest to us that these disturbances will become more common. Epping is not like the largely Northern, post-industrial towns which protested last summer after the Southport attack. It is a leafy area, where you need a middle-class income to afford a mortgage.
One of the videos from Thursday’s protest showed the difference. A mother who looked like she would be more at home on the school run in an SUV than with a megaphone gave a rousing speech, saying that they were there to protect their children. That is because the trigger for the protests was an alleged sexual assault on a 14-year-old girl by a recently arrived Ethiopian asylum seeker, Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, staying at the asylum hotel.
The failure of this Government and the last to stop the small boats crossings is radicalising Middle England. Every week brings more young men from some of the poorest and most violent societies on earth. Some will successfully claim asylum because they claim to come from places to which they cannot be deported. They are often kept in hotels, at a cost of billions to the tax payer. Although the Government brags that hotel numbers are on the way down, asylum seekers are also being put in flats and HMOs across the country.
Increasingly there is nowhere you can go where you won’t find asylum seekers barracked nearby, with all the risks that come with that. Most recently, Eritrean Aron Hadash was convicted of assaulting a 19-year-old with learning difficulties, which make her “very childlike”. That did not matter to Hadash, who was living at taxpayer expense in a nearby Holiday Inn. Intoxicated, he pinned her down, grabbed her breasts, and touched her crotch for several minutes before she escaped. Despite showing no remorse and the judge saying that he poses a “high risk of serious harm to the public”, he was sentenced to only 14 months and has already been released after serving a year on remand.
That is why ordinary people came out onto the streets of Epping. Although there have been reports of members of the far-Right attending, the hand-made signs and mixed nature of the crowd suggests that it is largely locals. Tommy Robinson may have said he will join the protests this coming weekend, but that shows that he too was caught out. Most of the professional protestors were from counter-protestors from Stand up to Racism, who arrived from out of town with their professionally printed placards, only to be run out again by furious locals. That should actually worry the authorities more. A handful of troublemakers is one thing, a community up in arms is another.
There is a logic to such community backlash. Last month, in Ballymena, the horrific rape of a local girl, allegedly by Roma teenagers, led to riots over several days that targeted Roma and other foreigners. In the aftermath, many of the Roma have left or been moved to new accommodation. Many locals are said to be pleased, claiming that anti-social behaviour has subsequently reduced.
This shift in attitudes can also be seen in the increasingly fractious relationship between the police and the public. Images of a police van smashing into a protestor without stopping on Thursday shocked many. The sight of the police evacuating Stand up to Racism protestors in vans was also controversial, even if it was probably a sensible tactical decision to get them away. The revelation last week of a secret, multi-billion pound programme to smuggle Afghans into Britain while muzzling the press has only further reduced trust. People find it hard to believe in the rule of law when our borders go unguarded, while prosperous market towns have riot police on the streets.
Restoring trust requires action. Our broken human rights laws are at the root of the small boat crisis, which is why Suella Braverman and I co-wrote a paper published this week which shows how Britain can leave the European Convention on Human Rights. Once we have regained control of our borders, we can begin closing the asylum hotels and HMOs. Those granted asylum over the last few years should have their cases reexamined, to see if they are genuine or if they were only beneficiaries of our overly-generous laws. This will help make our country safer for women and girls, bringing peace back to our streets.