{"id":121714,"date":"2026-03-13T12:46:53","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T15:46:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tech.einnews.com\/article\/899191845"},"modified":"2026-03-13T12:46:53","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T15:46:53","slug":"why-is-steph-curry-investing-in-israeli-security-tech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/2026\/03\/13\/why-is-steph-curry-investing-in-israeli-security-tech\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Is Steph Curry Investing in Israeli Security Tech?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Society<\/a> <\/span> <\/span> \/ <\/span> March 13, 2026<\/span> <\/div>\n
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The greatest shooter ever is part of a financial ecosystem in which Silicon Valley capital pours into Israeli technology companies with ties to the IDF.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Stephen Curry of the Golden State Warriors tugs at his jersey in a game against the Atlanta Hawks on January 11, 2026, in San Francisco, California.<\/p>\n

(Lachlan Cunningham \/ Getty Images)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Steph Curry is the greatest shooter ever. His three-ball revolutionized the game, ushering in the \u201cpace and space\u201d and \u201cfive-out\u201d era. After 16 seasons in the NBA, he\u2019s more than a sure-fire Hall of Famer; he\u2019s a mythic hero.<\/p>\n

But Curry\u2019s mythology rests not just on his basketball brilliance but also his goodness. He is the humble superstar, the smiling assassin. Throughout his long career, he\u2019s remained largely controversy-free. He\u2019s the corny dad, the dutiful husband. His relative lack of height\u2014he\u2019s listed at 6 foot-2\u2014makes suburban kids believe they can do what he does while bricking shots in the driveway.<\/p>\n

Curry\u2019s activism has rarely strayed beyond consensus liberalism. When the United States fractures, he offers a milquetoast quote. During the Minneapolis protests, he called the turnout \u201cbeautiful,\u201d saying it \u201cspeaks to how important people felt it was to have their voice heard.\u201d He funds literacy and nutrition programs in Oakland through the Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Current Issue <\/h4>\n

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In 2023, the NBA named him<\/a> the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Social Justice Champion, an award established in 2021 to recognize players advancing racial and economic justice. The honor stamped him as morally fluent, a superstar operating on the right side of history.<\/p>\n

But now after four championships, two MVPs, and a Finals MVP\u2014and just three years after the NBA celebrated Curry\u2019s acts of social justice\u2014Curry is underwriting the architecture of the Israeli security state. Curry is helping to give cover to a system in which Silicon Valley capital fuels the private-sector companies that prop up Israeli oppression.<\/p>\n

As a special adviser to Penny Jar Capital, Curry has participated in major venture rounds funding Israeli cybersecurity start-ups. Penny Jar<\/a> has backed Upwind Security, which raised more than $300 million, and Zafran, which secured $30 million<\/a>. Those firms sell cybersecurity tools and maintain deep ties to Israel\u2019s security infrastructure. Upwind<\/a> monitors cloud systems and alerts customers if someone tries to break in. Zafran makes software that scans a company\u2019s computer networks and tells it which security weaknesses need to be fixed first. Both companies are led by veterans of Israel\u2019s elite military intelligence units, including Unit 8200 and Mamram.<\/p>\n

Unit 8200 started in the 1950s as a signals unit rigging antennas on hills and tapping lines, but it grew into Israel\u2019s version of the National Security Agency, a vast intelligence factory built to intercept, decode, hack, and feed information up the chain. The unit effectively works as an incubator<\/a>, training soldiers in warfare and then spitting them out as founders and executives in Israel\u2019s cybersecurity economy. One of Zafran\u2019s founders, CEO Sanaz Yashar<\/a>, was a spy<\/a> in Unit 8200 for 15 years, and his story inspired the Apple TV thriller Tehran<\/em>.<\/p>\n

There is no public, official statement from Zafran Security or Upwind framing their work as connected to the war on Gaza. Nor does either company advertise its products as tools of military aggression. But Upwind\u2019s leadership and staff\u2014many of whom served in Israel\u2019s military intelligence units<\/a>\u2014have been called up as reservists during the war, a fact referenced in communications from company founders<\/a> on LinkedIn. Upwind\u2019s CEO, Amiram Shachar, shared a photo of himself with Curry following October 7, and the company has said it will be added to the US government\u2019s list of certified cybersecurity providers, underscoring its integration into national security markets.<\/p>\n

One key intermediary in Curry\u2019s Israeli investments is Omri Casspi, the NBA\u2019s first Israeli-born player and a former teammate of Curry\u2019s on the Warriors. Casspi now runs Sheva<\/a>, a venture capital firm focused on Israeli start-ups. Sheva co-led Upwind\u2019s early funding round and helped connect Curry\u2019s Penny Jar Capital to the deal. The former player has become a connector behind the scenes of the NBA, helping to bring NBA players to Israel. Casspi has described his project as a kind of \u201cZionism 2.0<\/a>\u201d in which he plugs IDF-trained technologists into the venture-backed infrastructure that undergirds Israel\u2019s economic and strategic power.<\/p>\n

In a 2017 interview<\/a>, Casspi described how NBA players like Curry fit into this: \u201cWhat I wanted to accomplish was to create a better awareness by bringing big celebrities with a lot of followers on social media, creating goodwill ambassadors for Israel. Unfortunately, Israel gets a bad rep sometimes in the media. These guys are from places like Baltimore and Alabama. And there are kids down there who follow them really closely, and they see that they\u2019ve been to Israel, and that creates good energy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many of Casspi\u2019s trips to Israel have been funded<\/a> by Dallas Mavericks owner and major Donald Trump donor Miriam Adelson and her now-deceased husband, Sheldon. Casspi has made it his mission to normalize Israel and its actions in the eyes of the West, and he has long been outspoken in his support of the Israel Defense Forces. In 2012, he told<\/a> the Akron Beacon Journal<\/em>, \u201cIt\u2019s hard to have peace with people who really hate you. They don\u2019t want you to live. They\u2019d rather kill their kids and kill you, too. They\u2019re crazy people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since October 7, Casspi has doubled down on his support. He\u2019s interviewed Ben Shapiro<\/a> and collaborated with Sheryl Sandberg on her documentary Screams Before Silence<\/em>, a film centered on unproven allegations of Hamas sexual violence that was promoted aggressively in Western media. Casspi criticizes boycott movements, organizes NBA trips that function as soft-power tours, and channels US venture capital into Israeli start-ups built by veterans of its intelligence apparatus.<\/p>\n

Casspi\u2019s narrative posturing and the intersection of Silicon Valley money and Israel\u2019s security sector is common in the larger venture ecosystem. Sequoia Capital, one of Silicon Valley\u2019s most powerful venture firms and a lead investor in Zafran, faced controversy after partner Shaun Maguire<\/a> posted Islamophobic and aggressively pro-Israel statements, at times framing the war in civilizational terms and amplifying inflammatory narratives about Palestinians and Muslims. Following a US campus shooting, Maguire wrote in a now-deleted post<\/a>, \u201cIt seems very likely that the Brown shooter was an ardent pro-Palestine activist of Palestinian heritage. Mustapha Kharbouch Brown is actively scrubbing his online presence.\u201d None of which was true.<\/p>\n

Francesa Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, has argued that this interlocking system of venture capital and Israeli tech-security is an \u201ceconomy of genocide\u201d and urged corporations to abstain from participating in it. Curry, however, is profiting from and lending his celebrity to this funding ecosystem.<\/p>\n

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    In affect, Curry is the NBA\u2019s version of Barack Obama. Both project calm intelligence and technocratic restraint. Both maintain a frictionless decency that reassures the professional class. If Curry or Obama did it, how bad could it really be? (As a reminder, for his part in all this, Obama expanded US drone warfare and surveillance, opening more space for these companies.)<\/p>\n

    The Warriors\u2019 proximity to Israeli tech and defense-linked networks isn\u2019t new. In 2018, Draymond Green went on a trip<\/a> to Israel organized in part by Friends of the IDF, a US-based nonprofit that raises funds for Israeli soldiers. The visit was framed as a cultural exchange, but critics like The Nation<\/em>\u2019s Dave Zirin<\/a> viewed it as part of a broader effort to align US athletes with Israeli state institutions. Curry\u2019s former teammate Kevin Durant is reported<\/a> to have invested in the autonomous drone company Skydio, which supplied short-range reconnaissance drones to the Israeli military.<\/p>\n

    For decades, Silicon Valley capital has moved through Israel\u2019s security sector. Unit 8200 functions as a pipeline, training intelligence officers who later launch venture-backed start-ups. Curry\u2019s investments just add cultural legitimacy to that pipeline. The NBA\u2019s most celebrated good guy\u2014I mean he just released an animated movie about a hooping goat<\/a>\u2014becomes a connective tissue between American celebrity wealth and the intelligence ecosystem behind a genocide. Curry\u2019s reputation shields capital, while that capital fortifies evil.<\/p>\n

    William Rhoden, the author of Forty Million Dollar Slaves: The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Black Athlete<\/em>, describes how Black athletic genius is folded into structures of power that redirect it toward on- and off-court capital. Rhoden\u2019s argument is that the modern sports industry turns Black athletic labor into an economic engine largely controlled by owners, leagues, and corporate partners. The athlete becomes both performer and brand: Their talent generates billions in revenue while their image is used to legitimize the institutions that profit from them. Curry\u2019s move into Israeli security-tech investments reflects that pattern in a disturbing way. His public image carries cultural cachet. Rhoden\u2019s thesis helps explain how a player celebrated for social justice can seamlessly transition into financing companies built by veterans of a genocidal intelligence apparatus without his brand taking any hits.<\/p>\n

    Few athletes in modern sports carry the cultural trust Curry does. He is the NBA\u2019s smiling technocrat\u2014universally admired, controversy-free. That image is now part of the Israeli tech security ecosystem\u2019s soft power. When Curry invests, his smiling photo with a start-up founder obfuscates the fact that military intelligence veterans are building an oppressive security infrastructure.<\/p>\n

    Curry\u2019s jumper is eternal. But legacies are built off the court, too. And myth, once hardened, is difficult to revise. It\u2019s never too late for him to drop his investments in IDF-adjacent tech start-ups. It would be the boldest statement he\u2019s ever made. If not, he is tarnishing a legacy that not even championships can offset.<\/p>\n

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    Even before February 28, the reasons for Donald Trump\u2019s imploding approval rating were abundantly clear: untrammeled corruption and personal enrichment to the tune of billions of dollars during an affordability crisis, a foreign policy guided only by his own derelict sense of morality, and the deployment of a murderous campaign of occupation, detention, and deportation on American streets. <\/span><\/p>\n

    Now an undeclared, unauthorized, unpopular, and unconstitutional war of aggression against Iran has spread like wildfire through the region and into Europe. A new \u201cforever war\u201d\u2014with an ever-increasing likelihood of American troops on the ground\u2014may very well be upon us.  <\/span><\/p>\n

    As we\u2019ve seen over and over, this administration uses lies, misdirection, and attempts to flood the zone to justify its abuses of power at home and abroad. Just as Trump, Marco Rubio, and Pete Hegseth offer erratic and contradictory rationales for the attacks on Iran, the administration is also spreading the lie that the upcoming midterm elections are under threat from noncitizens on voter rolls. When these lies go unchecked, they become the basis for further authoritarian encroachment and war. <\/span><\/p>\n

    In these dark times, independent journalism is uniquely able to uncover the falsehoods that threaten our republic\u2014and civilians around the world\u2014and shine a bright light on the truth.<\/b> <\/span><\/p>\n

    The Nation<\/span><\/i>\u2019s experienced team of writers, editors, and fact-checkers understands the scale of what we\u2019re up against and the urgency with which we have to act. That\u2019s why we\u2019re publishing critical reporting and analysis of the war on Iran, ICE violence at home, new forms of voter suppression emerging in the courts, and much more. <\/span><\/p>\n

    But this journalism is possible only with your support.<\/span><\/p>\n

    This March, <\/b>The Nation <\/i><\/b>needs to raise $50,000 to ensure that we have the resources for reporting and analysis that sets the record straight and empowers people of conscience to organize. Will you donate today?<\/a>
    <\/b><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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    Lee Escobedo<\/a> <\/h5>\n
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    Lee Escobedo is a poet, itinerant curator, and conceptual artist whose work moves across sports, art, and cultural criticism, exploring the intersections of athletics, politics, identity, and visual culture. His writing and cultural commentary have appeared in publications including The Guardian<\/em>, Artform<\/em>, Vice<\/em>, and Vogue<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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    … capital pours into Israeli technology<\/span> companies with ties to … venture capital and Israeli tech<\/span>-security is an \u00e2\u0080\u009ceconomy of … Warriors\u00e2\u0080\u0099 proximity to Israeli tech<\/span> and defense-linked networks … move into Israeli security-tech<\/span> investments reflects that pattern …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-121714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121714\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new7.shop\/zerocostfreehost\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}