\n<\/p>\n
An Israeli drone company, malaria testing technology, and the proposed sale of an American billionaire\u2019s oil and gas empire are among the many previously unknown business ventures that former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak discussed with the late sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein, leaked emails reveal.<\/p>\n
Epstein served as a trusted financial adviser, fixer, concierge, sounding board, and even friend to the ex-Israeli leader during a long-running relationship that blurred professional and personal boundaries, the emails suggest.<\/p>\n
list of 4 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/p>\n While Barak has previously acknowledged having a business relationship with Epstein via the Israeli emergency services startup Reporty, the communications suggest that the politician coordinated with the disgraced financier on several previously unknown business proposals, relying heavily on his advice and connections.<\/p>\n Barak, who led Israel from 1999 to 2001 and served as the country\u2019s defence minister from 2007 to March 2013, also sought Epstein\u2019s input on drafts of newspaper op-eds and used an apartment in New York City arranged by the financier to write his autobiography.<\/p>\n The\u00a0two men\u00a0also exchanged holiday greetings, and Epstein\u00a0sent his condolences to\u00a0Barak\u00a0when his mother passed away in 2013.<\/p>\n Like many powerful figures in Epstein\u2019s orbit, Barak, who said he first met the late financier in 2003, continued his association with Epstein for years after he became a convicted sex offender following a controversial plea deal in 2008.<\/p>\n The\u00a0emails, which span 2013 to 2016,\u00a0were published in August by the whistleblower site Distributed Denial of Secrets\u00a0after being\u00a0stolen\u00a0by\u00a0the\u00a0hacktivist group\u00a0Handala, which the government of Canada has linked to Iran\u2019s intelligence agencies.<\/p>\n Barak did not respond to requests for comment\u00a0sent to his personal email address and those of his lawyers and publisher.<\/p>\n Barak\u2019s prospective business partners in the various deals he discussed with Epstein also did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n Just months after Barak ended his tenure as Israel\u2019s defence chief in 2013, Epstein promised to make the politician hundreds of millions of dollars in an email flexing his skills as a financial adviser.<\/p>\n \u201cWe both know that with my involvement at a senior level you will be able to achieve, not so many but at least few hundred million more than without my help. To date you have not made a real proposal, and though I am happy to move forward I would need a firm serious offer to do so,\u201d Epstein wrote to Barak in the email dated September 20, 2013.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n That November, it appears that Epstein\u00a0sought\u00a0to renegotiate the terms of an\u00a0agreement\u00a0for his financial services\u00a0following a delayed payment.<\/p>\n \u201cI think best that after this is\u00a0received\u00a0we look to form a new arrangement that meets both of our needs,\u201d\u00a0Epstein\u00a0wrote.<\/p>\n Epstein, who indicated in their correspondence that he had already been paid at least $5m, proposed that he receive a $2m annual retainer plus a percentage of profits.<\/p>\n It is unclear what terms, if any,\u00a0the two men\u00a0ultimately agreed\u00a0upon.<\/p>\n Among the projects that Barak appears to have sought Epstein\u2019s advice on was a proposed investment in Israeli startup Light & Strong, which in 2014 was working on solar-powered, high-altitude, long endurance (HALE) drones in an initiative dubbed \u201cProject Sun Spark\u201d.<\/p>\n Founded in Israel in 2007, Light & Strong produced military and aerospace components for the Israeli state and defence industry.<\/p>\n Two Israeli\u00a0businessmen, Ofer Amir and Gal Erez, bought the company from a liquidator in 2014 after\u00a0a previous\u00a0owner went bankrupt.<\/p>\n Amir and Erez hoped that Light & Strong could rival Google and Facebook with solar-powered drones capable of boosting mobile phone and broadband coverage, according to a company prospectus. The drones also offered a secondary use for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, the emails show.<\/p>\n \u201cThey would like\u00a0me\u00a0to join as Chairman and to consider\u00a0invest up to $1M based on $13M pre\u00a0money as part of a round that will raise\u00a0$3.0M ($16M post money valuation),\u201d\u00a0Barak\u00a0wrote\u00a0to\u00a0Epstein in October\u00a02014 after\u00a0he\u00a0was approached by Amir.<\/p>\n Epstein and his lawyer reviewed the\u00a0company\u2019s financial statements over\u00a0a flurry of\u00a0email\u00a0exchanges with\u00a0Barak\u00a0over\u00a0the\u00a0next few weeks before\u00a0Epstein issued a hard \u201cno\u201d on the\u00a0investment.<\/p>\n \u201cthis is crazy. the people writing this have no financial knowledge. they write for ex that this cashflow does not include depreciation.???? of course not. deprecitation has nothing to do with cashflow \u00a0nothing. STAY AWAY,\u201d Epstein wrote in a typically error-strewn email on November 27, 2014.<\/p>\n Light & Strong was later acquired by an Indian aerospace conglomerate, according to Israeli media.<\/p>\n Jeffrey Epstein appears in a photograph taken for the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services\u2019 sex offender registry on March 28, 2017 [File: New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services\/Handout via Reuters]<\/p>\n Epstein\u2019s advice took a similar tone\u00a0when\u00a0Barak asked about a\u00a0potential deal with\u00a0the late\u00a0Denver, Colorado-based\u00a0oil tycoon\u00a0Jack\u00a0Grynberg.<\/p>\n Barak\u2019s emails\u00a0indicate\u00a0that\u00a0he felt\u00a0a\u00a0personal affinity for\u00a0Grynberg, who\u00a0had\u00a0shared his experience\u00a0of\u00a0surviving the Holocaust as a child\u00a0before\u00a0making a\u00a0multibillion-dollar fortune in oil and\u00a0gas.<\/p>\n A judge later found that\u00a0Grynberg, who\u00a0died\u00a0in 2021 aged\u00a089, \u201csuffered from insane delusions and failed to make rational decisions\u201d in\u00a0the waning\u00a0years\u00a0of his life\u00a0as he tried to keep his fortune out of the hands of his family.<\/p>\n Grynberg engaged Barak in 2014 to help broker the sale of one of his oil and gas companies, Gadeco LLC.<\/p>\n The oil tycoon\u00a0proposed offloading a\u00a025 percent stake\u00a0in the company\u00a0for\u00a0$400m,\u00a0or a 100 percent stake for $1.6bn.<\/p>\n Barak agreed to help broker the deal for a 5 percent commission \u2013 to be divided among himself and business associates \u2013 and suggested two \u201cChinese and Russian candidates\u201d.<\/p>\n Barak\u2019s emails show that in October 2014, he approached China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), the Israeli-Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, and Hong Kong entrepreneur Joachim Chao, who was representing a \u201cconsortium of Chinese private companies\u201d.<\/p>\n The emails also suggest that Epstein helped\u00a0Barak\u00a0approach the staff of Leon Black, the billionaire cofounder of private equity firm Apollo Global Management, about the sale.<\/p>\n Barak\u00a0asked for Epstein\u2019s advice\u00a0in late October in a series of\u00a0emails with the subject line \u201cJG Co. Sale\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cHi Jeff Thx for your support. Pl share with me your impression from the JG Co. Materials once you\u2019ve looked through them. Do not hesitate to correct or direct me along the way. I don\u2019t have enough time to learn from my own mistakes,\u201d Barak wrote.<\/p>\n Epstein told him to avoid the sale at all costs\u00a0a few hours later.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is total 100 percent BULLSHIT. I told you on the phone before sending or asking anyone about it you should do your own homework, You cannot be seen to be selling garbage ,frauds. Bad things and or trouble,\u201d Epstein wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a total waste of your time.\u00a0Call me when awake.\u201d<\/p>\n Two days later, Barak emailed Epstein to thank him for his advice and inform him he had \u201csoftly killed the GADECO story\u201d.<\/p>\n In early November,\u00a0Barak\u00a0informed\u00a0Grynberg\u00a0he could no longer help with the sale, but by the middle of the month, negotiations with Chao\u00a0were\u00a0back on, according to the emails.<\/p>\n Negotiations with Chao appeared\u00a0to\u00a0fizzle out by December,\u00a0and the sale did not\u00a0proceed.<\/p>\n Grynberg\u00a0later lost control of his business empire in 2019 following a successful lawsuit by his family.<\/p>\n Epstein played a supporting role\u00a0for Barak\u00a0in other ways,\u00a0including by\u00a0offering\u00a0his\u00a0Manhattan\u00a0home to host business meetings.<\/p>\n Those meetings included a September 2013 encounter between Barak and Boris Nikolic, a biotech venture capitalist and then-chief adviser for science and technology at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.<\/p>\n At the time,\u00a0Barak\u00a0sat on the advisory board of\u00a0the\u00a0Israeli biotech startup\u00a0Parasight, which was developing a platform to test blood for malaria and parasites.<\/p>\n Barak solicited Nikolic\u2019s feedback on the technology, which was undergoing clinical trials in India, in the hopes that the Gates Foundation might invest in Parasight, later renamed Sight Diagnostics.<\/p>\n Nikolic later passed\u00a0on the opportunity, telling\u00a0Parasight\u00a0that the Gates Foundation was avoiding \u201cmachine-based technology\u201d\u00a0due to the difficulty of deploying\u00a0it\u00a0in remote parts of Africa.<\/p>\n Epstein often steered Barak to reach out to high-profile individuals spanning politics, business, academia and entertainment, or in many cases offered to connect Barak himself.<\/p>\n The list included then-president of the Maldives Abdulla Yameen; former French President Nicolas Sarkozy; outgoing New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg; former Harvard President Larry Summers; billionaire tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel; public intellectual Noam Chomsky; and film director Woody Allen.<\/p>\n It is unclear how many of these meetings took place.<\/p>\n Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a volunteer organisation\u2019s forum in Moscow, Russia, on December 3, 2025 [File: Alexander Shcherbak\/pool via AFP]<\/p>\n One event that did go forward, however, was a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2013 while Barak was in Moscow.<\/p>\n \u201cI think you should let Putin know you will be in Moscow. See if he wants private time,\u201d Epstein wrote to\u00a0Barak in May of that year.<\/p>\n Epstein and\u00a0Barak\u00a0both hoped to convince Putin to abandon his support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and help bring an end to the Syrian civil war, according to an investigation by\u00a0Drop Site News that reviewed the same trove of emails.<\/p>\n Acting as a backchannel for the Israeli government, Barak met with Putin in June 2013, but he failed to sway him.<\/p>\n Another important connection for\u00a0Barak\u00a0was\u00a0the\u00a0billionaire French banker\u00a0Ariane\u00a0de Rothschild, whose relationship with Epstein was also reported on by Drop Site news.<\/p>\n Epstein advised Barak on how to approach the banker, the emails show.<\/p>\n De Rothschild had previously told Epstein that Barak would need to \u201cbuild a relationship\u201d with her if he wanted \u201cto make serious money\u201d, according to Epstein\u2019s account of the conversation.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m ready. But I need your advise re HOW? ( ladies is your fort\u00e9),\u201d Barak wrote to Epstein on November 21, 2013, in reference to De Rothschild.<\/p>\n \u201ctime. \u00a0attention. \u00a0stable. recurring.,\u00a0\u00a0PREDICTABLE\u00a0\u00a0where\u00a0\u00a0what when,\u201d Epstein replied a few hours later.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Epstein also suggested in a June 2014 email to Barak that De Rothschild\u2019s foundation had\u00a0unspecified problems with the\u00a0Israeli government that the\u00a0politician\u00a0should be briefed on.<\/p>\n Around this time, Epstein was pursuing Rothschild to fund Israeli \u201coffensive cyber\u201d startups, according to Drop Site News.<\/p>\n Barak shared similar interests, including in the Israeli cloud security startup Guardicore. He suggested in August 2014 that Epstein pass a one-page backgrounder on Guardicore to PayPal.<\/p>\n It is unclear whether Epstein followed his advice, and Guardicore was later acquired by cloud service provider Akamai Technology.<\/p>\n Ariane de Rothschild speaks during a news conference before the unveiling of the Ultim multihull Gitana 18 Maxi Edmond de Rothschild yacht in Lorient, France, on December 3, 2025 [File: Loic Venance\/AFP]<\/p>\n Barak\u2019s\u00a0correspondence\u00a0with Epstein\u00a0at times pointed to a deep\u00a0personal\u00a0friendship.<\/p>\n \u201c[t]here\u00a0are\u00a0very few people\u00a0that\u00a0i\u00a0enjoy spending time\u00a0with, \u00a0you\u00a0are\u00a0unique,\u201d\u00a0Epstein wrote\u00a0to\u00a0Barak\u00a0on September\u00a021, 2013.<\/p>\n \u201cThx. The same. EB,\u201d\u00a0Barak\u00a0wrote\u00a0back.<\/p>\n Epstein\u00a0gave\u00a0Barak\u00a0access to\u00a0an\u00a0apartment\u00a0in New York, and on one occasion, arranged for the delivery of a piano\u00a0to\u00a0the property.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u00a0are\u00a0in the\u00a0apartment. So cute. And your team prepared it with so much attention to details. Thank you very much. It is so helpful for this task of\u00a0writing\u00a0a\u00a0book,\u201d\u00a0Barak\u00a0wrote\u00a0on July 25, 2015.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Epstein also invited\u00a0Barak\u00a0and his wife, Nili Priel,\u00a0to visit his\u00a0private island, Little Saint John, in the Caribbean.<\/p>\n Barak\u00a0shared a potential travel itinerary with Epstein to visit his island in January 2014, but that trip appears to have been cancelled.<\/p>\n In December of that year, Barak\u2019s wife shared a new travel itinerary to travel to St Thomas, an island close to Little St James, with Epstein.<\/p>\n \u201cwe\u00a0can arrive to St. Thomas Friday, December 12 from NY at 12:55 PM with AA 1275\u00a0And leave on Monday, December 15 at 2 PM to NY with AA 1275. Does this suit you?\u201d she wrote in an email\u00a0forwarded\u00a0to\u00a0Barak.<\/p>\n The following week, Barak thanked Epstein for his \u201chospitality\u201d and complimented him on his \u201cGreat, impressive island\u201d.<\/p>\n Barak referred to the visit again in a February 2015 email to Epstein that mentioned a bodyguard who joined the former Israeli leader in \u201cLSJ on the second day\u201d.<\/p>\n A drone view shows a pool on Little St James, a small private island formerly owned by the late financier Jeffrey Epstein, in the US Virgin Islands, on November 29, 2025 [File: Marco Bello\/Reuters]<\/p>\n After Epstein was arrested on sex trafficking charges in 2019, Barak announced that he had \u201ccut all ties\u201d with his former business partner.<\/p>\n In a 2023 interview with The Wall Street Journal, Barak adamantly denied attending any of Epstein\u2019s \u201cparties or activities involving girls and women\u201d.<\/p>\n The leaked emails show that Barak had been approached years earlier for comment about his knowledge of Epstein\u2019s activities.<\/p>\n In 2015, The Mirror newspaper contacted Barak to give him a chance to comment on whether he was aware that his business partner was \u201cpaying underage girls for sex\u201d.<\/p>\n In a letter sent through his lawyers, Barak denied any knowledge of criminality by Epstein.<\/p>\n \u201cAs to your question about my awareness of Mr. Epstein\u2019s activity, you are assuming allegations as fact and, even if the allegations turn out to be true, I was never aware that Mr. Epstein, to quote you, \u2018was paying underage girls for sex.’\u201d<\/p>\n The Mirror ultimately did not publish an article about Barak\u2019s ties to Epstein following its correspondence with the politician.<\/p>\n Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak delivers a statement in Tel Aviv, Israel, on June 26, 2019 [File: Corinna Kern\/Reuters]<\/p>\n While Barak\u2019s relationship with Epstein opened up a world of elite connections and business opportunities, it overshadowed his aspirations for a political comeback in Israel.<\/p>\n At the time of Epstein\u2019s arrest in July 2019, Barak was seeking to challenge Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in upcoming elections under the banner of the newly formed Democratic Union, an alliance of left-leaning parties.<\/p>\n One month later, Epstein died in a Manhattan jail cell in what was later ruled a suicide.<\/p>\n That September, Barak failed to win a seat in the Knesset \u2013 Israel\u2019s legislature \u2013 when his alliance underperformed in the polls amid renewed scrutiny of his ties to Epstein.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" An Israeli drone company, malaria testing technology, and the proposed sale of an American billionaire\u2019s oil and gas empire are among the many previously unknown business ventures that former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak discussed with the late sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein, leaked emails reveal. Epstein served as a trusted financial adviser, fixer,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36507,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[360,20371,1083,20370,3813,3703,10280,2164,150,1457,1507,359],"class_list":{"0":"post-36506","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics","8":"tag-assault","9":"tag-barak","10":"tag-close","11":"tag-ehud","12":"tag-emails","13":"tag-epstein","14":"tag-expm","15":"tag-israels","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-relationship","18":"tag-reveal","19":"tag-sexual"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36506\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/36507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\u2018Total waste of your time\u2019<\/h2>\n