The universities in Epstein's network, overshadowed by the attack on Iran

On 28 February the US and Israel began their brigandage against our neighbor Iran, and we have now left one month of it behind. It is quite clear that the US and Israel, driven mad by their brute force and swollen with arrogance, have experienced a disappointment about their own strength in this month, but we also see that they are not hiding their astonishment at the performance Iran has shown in holding out, in sustaining the war, and even, after a certain point, in taking control of the war.

GET THE NEWS FROM TRUMP

In such cases we can now say "get the news from Trump." Not because Trump has a child's innocence, never, but because he has a child's blabbermouth. It is his familiar style to sometimes spill out the country's secrets, information, its subconscious and its conscious, while showing off his courage, or boasting, or lamenting. Indeed, amid a great deal of verbiage we heard confessions in this direction too: We did not expect this much. Neither from Iran nor from ourselves.

It seems there is much more they have not yet expected, though let us not speak too big; what is to come will be among the things we too did not expect.

For example, we have not yet been able to work out a logic to this aggression of the US and Israel. At every step a different piece of information, a different balance sheet, a different calculation emerges. Was the closing of the Strait of Hormuz after Venezuela, for example, something unexpected, or was it already a step taken to block China's oil supply? So is China actually the real target of the attacks on both Venezuela and Iran? If so, what is Israel doing in this war? Are its Zionist theo-political ambitions also an instrument of the real US-China rivalry? These are of course serious questions. They are not the kind that can be resolved by sticking to a single theory and remaining on the same line to the end. At every stage there can be developments that strain each theory. A complete story of a madman's thrown stone. Even a thousand wise men cannot get it out.

Or perhaps the matter has to do precisely with Epstein, the US's greatest scandal. The justification for Israel's attack on Iran has never so far seemed convincing to the US, but the damned Epstein case has this time convinced the decision-makers on behalf of the US to finally give this "belated" war.

FROM COLUMBIA TO HARVARD, FROM YALE TO UCLA

Since the war that began on 28 February, does anyone hear anything now about the Epstein case, which before it we lived and breathed every day in all its details? Yet the Epstein case was an earthquake of magnitude 10 that shook not only the US but the whole world and will shake it further. Perhaps the most important reason for the war against Iran.

Where were we? In the days right before the war, for example, the subject had extended to universities. A series of developments had come one after another, and when the surface of the famous, certified, prestigious universities of the US was scratched, what a scandal it revealed.

This time the matter is not merely a scandal; it is the exposure of a disturbing reality about the inner workings of academia. The documents published right before the war were making visible a network of relationships that had in fact been spoken of behind closed doors for years. The names and institutions whose ties to Jeffrey Epstein came to light were shaking not only politics but the world's most prestigious universities.

First, in the developments at Harvard University, former Treasury Secretary and former Harvard president Larry Summers decided to step down from his academic and administrative posts at the university after his close relations with Epstein going back many years were revealed through documents. It was reflected to the public that Summers kept in contact with Epstein even after his conviction, even received advice on his private life, and was named in his will.

But the matter is not only the resignation of one academic. The same documents reveal that despite Epstein's conviction in 2008 he entered the Harvard campus dozens of times, that special areas were allocated to him, and that the university accepted millions of dollars in donations from him. This picture lays bare how an institution that gives education on "ethical values" can fall silent before a donation.

A similar situation emerged at Columbia University as well. It was confirmed by documents that Epstein's girlfriend, though she would normally have been rejected, was admitted to the university through a special process and that a donation was made shortly after this admission. The dismissal of some senior academic administrators following the incident showed that this was not an isolated mistake but an institutional weakness.

The investigation was not limited to these two universities. Investigations into Epstein-linked academic relationships and ethical violations were also launched at institutions such as UCLA, Yale and Arizona State. Indeed, some documents revealed that the relationships academics established with Epstein reached not only financial but also extremely problematic personal dimensions.

When all these developments are put together, the picture that emerges is clear: Epstein was not merely a donor; he was a center of power able to be influential over universities.

So how did he achieve this?

THE ANSWER HAS THREE LAYERS: MONEY, NETWORK AND LEGITIMACY

First, the donation mechanism. American universities are institutions that to a great extent survive on donations. Although this structure is presented in theory as a model that supports academic freedom, in practice it opens a serious sphere of influence for donors. Epstein used this sphere not only to provide financial support but to open institutional doors. The donation here was not a favor but an admission ticket.

Second, social and intellectual networks. Epstein built a network of relationships that surrounded him not only with financial circles but with academics, politicians and the technology elite. This network turned universities' relationship with him from an ordinary donor relationship into a much more complex relationship of dependency.

Third and most critical: the production of legitimacy. Universities gave prestige to Epstein; Epstein provided resources to universities. This reciprocal relationship led to the normalization, even the protection, of a figure stained with crime within academic circles.

At this point, however, what is truly dangerous is that these relationships are not limited to ethical violations. Such networks have the power to influence academic discourse and political positions indirectly.

You may rethink in this context the harsh reflexes that appear today in Western universities when it comes to criticisms of Israel and Zionism or saying anything in favor of Palestine. For it is now evident with concrete examples that financial dependencies and donor relationships can invisibly narrow the limits of academic freedom.

The question is this: If a donor can transfer millions of dollars to a university, can establish close relationships with academic staff and can even be involved in admission processes, can this power also shape the space of academic expression?

The pressures faced today by academics critical on the Palestine issue, the canceled conferences and the cut funds show that this question is not theoretical and of course cannot be dismissed. The Epstein file has exposed the barest form of this mechanism: Money finances not only research but also silence and limits.

More importantly, universities are not merely passive actors in this process. That Epstein was able to maintain his relationship with universities despite his conviction shows that these ties were often knowingly continued. This takes the problem beyond individual mistakes and turns it into a structural crisis.

Admittedly the Epstein scandal is not a closed file; it is a window opened onto the inner workings of academia. This window shows us, especially those looking admiringly from Turkey, those who constantly draw a lesson in quality for Turkey from these universities, the following: In the US, universities are not only centers of knowledge production but also, unfortunately, fields where power, capital and ideology intersect.