• @arno
    ARNO* ART LIBRE

    On the Emails Between Jeffrey Epstein and Noam Chomsky - Vijay Prashad
    ▻https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/02/03/on-the-emails-between-jeffrey-epstein-and-noam-chomsky

    Since Noam cannot speak or write and explain his relationship with Epstein, the matter is fraught. There is nothing to say on his behalf. When the photos and emails appeared, I was immediately disgusted by Epstein’s paedophilia, and so by Noam’s friendship with him. There is no defence for this, in my view, no context that can explain this outrage.

    I asked Jeffery St. Clair, the editor of CounterPunch, what our common friend Alexander Cockburn would have made of these revelations. ‘Alex would have been troubled, I think’, Jeffrey wrote, ‘about Noam having such a close relationship with an ultra-Zionist, and probable Israeli agent… Seriously bad judgment from someone who usually makes such considered and thoroughly reasoned decisions’. Epstein was a man of the Far Right and a Zionist – an accumulator of men of power and influence who want to turn the world into their paradise and our hell. He introduced Noam to Ehud Barak, a man who had faced corruption allegations in the early 2000s and who had committed war crimes during his tenure as Israeli Prime Minister. In 2009, Barak conducted a terrible war against the Palestinians in Gaza, murdering about 1500 Palestinians in cold blood. The United Nations investigation committee, chaired by Richard Goldstone, found in its report that the Israeli government – led by Barak – had committed war crimes. When Barak visited the United Kingdom that year, solicitors took a case to the City of Westminster to ask for a warrant under the 1988 Criminal Justice Act, which provides for universal jurisdiction in war crimes cases. No such warrant materialised. Why would Noam meet a war criminal in 2015, six years after these events? When I asked Noam in 2021, for our first book The Withdrawal, if he would have gone to meet with Henry Kissinger, he laughed and said, no. And yet, he had earlier – unbeknownst to me, met with a war criminal.

    Why consort so freely with a person of that disposition? Why provide comfort and advice to a paedophile for his crimes?

    From my side, I am horrified and shocked.

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    • @arno
      ARNO* ART LIBRE

      Noam Chomsky, Jeffrey Epstein and the Politics of Betrayal - Chris Hedges
      ▻https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/noam-chomsky-jeffrey-epstein-and

      I don’t expect much from politicians, corporate tycoons, the presidents of prestigious universities, billionaire philanthropists, celebrities, royalty or oligarchs. They live in narcissistic and hedonistic bubbles that cater to their self-worship and moral depravity. But I do expect a lot from intellectuals such as Noam Chomsky. The explanation by his wife Valéria - Noam suffered a severe stroke in June 2023 and is incapacitated - of their relationship with Jeffrey Epstein is filled with the fatuous excuses used by all those who have been outed in the Epstein emails and documents. According to Valéria, she and Noam were “overly trusting.” This led to “poor judgment.” She writes that she and Noam were ensnared by dinners with luminaries at Epstein’s mansion, flights on his private jet nicknamed the Lolita Express, a literary reference to the sexual exploitation of girls Noam would have recognized, financial assistance, trips to Epstein’s ranch and the use of one of Epstein’s apartments in New York. Like everyone else outed in the Epstein files she and Noam “never witnessed any inappropriate behavior from Epstein or others.”

      Noam’s advice to Epstein on how to handle press inquiries into his crimes, like Noam’s letter of recommendation for Epstein, was, she insists, the result of Epstein’s taking “advantage of Noam’s public criticism towards what came to be known as ‘cancel culture’ to present himself as a victim of it.” After Epstein’s second arrest in 2019, she and Noam “were careless in not thoroughly researching his background.” She ends by expressing “unrestricted solidarity with the victims.” Her letter regurgitates the formula of everyone outed in the Epstein files. I know and have long admired Noam. He is, arguably, our greatest and most principled intellectual. I can assure you he is not as passive or gullible as his wife claims. He knew about Epstein’s abuse of children. They all knew. And like others in the Epstein orbit, he did not care. From the email correspondence between Epstein and Valéria it appears she particularly enjoyed the privileges that came with being in Epstein’s circle, but this does not absolve Noam’s acquiescence. Noam, of all people, knows the predatory nature of the ruling class and the cruelty of capitalists, where the vulnerable, especially girls and women, are commodified as objects to be used and exploited. He was not fooled by Epstein. He was seduced. His association with Epstein is a terrible and, to many, unforgivable stain. It irreparably tarnishes his legacy. If there is a lesson here, it is this. The ruling class offers nothing without expecting something in return. The closer you get to these vampires the more you become enslaved. Our role is not to socialize with them. It is to destroy them.

      ARNO* ART LIBRE
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