Tucker Carlson Accuses Israeli President Herzog of Ties to Epstein, Then Hastily Recants

Statement on Israeli President Isaac Herzog pic.twitter.com/z2hIAO9ptY

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) February 21, 2026

1/5@TuckerCarlson’s “apology” for maligning Israel’s Pres Isaac Herzog is nothing of the sort. His statement actually justifies his maligning of the president. Carlson relies on the recently released Jeffrey Epstein mail boasting that Ehud Barak and Herzog will be attending… pic.twitter.com/W148jXkuNR

— Frimet Roth (@FrimetRoth) February 22, 2026

On the basis of an email in the Epstein files, and possibly also of a single photograph that was uploaded to the internet, that purported to show a smiling Israeli President Isaac Herzog in a group photo with Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and two fetching young women, Tucker Carlson concluded that Herzog was one of those “friends of Jeffrey” up to no good, an Israeli analogue to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. In fact, he went further, claiming that Herzog visited Epstein at his private island. Now anyone familiar with Herzog knows that he is not only straight as an arrow, but even a bit of a straitlaced bore. And anyone familiar with the internet knows that with AI-generated fakes bestriding our planet, all bets are off on the truthfulness of photographs or for that matter, of anything else on our giddy globe.

More on Carlson’s charge, which in being made against the president of Israel is also directed at the entire state of Israel, can be found here: “‘Times’ journalist posts AI-generated picture of Isaac Herzog and Jeffrey Esptein, apologizes,” by James Genn, Jerusalem Post, February 10, 2026:

Gabrielle Sivia Weiniger, a journalist for The Times focusing on the Middle East region, apologized on Tuesday morning for posting a fake AI-generated picture that showed President Isaac Herzog posing for a picture with convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, his sex-trafficking associate Ghislaine Maxwell, and others.

“I mistakenly posted a photo of President Herzog, without checking the source, and I am sorry for that,” she wrote on X/Twitter after deleting the original post, noting that her article in the London-based outlet did not even mention Herzog.

“Just to clarify: the photograph was an AI fake,” she continued.

In his apology, Carlson didn’t mention the photo, so there is no way of knowing whether or not it influenced him. He did mention an email from Epstein saying that Herzog would be at a party. The lack of any evidence that he actually was there, or had any contact with Epstein at all, and the likelihood that the latter was simply trying to impress the recipient of the email by name-dropping, didn’t stop Tucker Carlson from rushing to the conclusion that Herzog was mixed up with Epstein’s crimes, and that linking Herzog to Epstein was yet another way for the antisemitic Carlson to implicate the Jewish state in nefarious doings.

Carlson certainly knew President Herzog’s reputation as a straight arrow. He had every reason to doubt that the email was any definite indication that Herzog had been anywhere, but didn’t bother to consult someone who might have been able to confirm that doubt. He preferred, without checking, to go with a story that would harm Israel’s president, and thus Israel itself.

Now Carlson has admitted, and the whole world knows, that the claim is false, and that Herzog has had nothing whatsoever to do with Epstein. So Carlson needs to add to his video statement above, apologizing to President Herzog, which he does not do in the existing video, and admitting that his desire to paint the Jewish state in a negative light has led him to abandon all journalistic standards.