Peter Thiel, billionaire tech investor and co-founder of PayPal and Palantir, arrived in Israel this week along with several prominent Silicon Valley figures to attend the wedding of Zach Frenkel, an investor at Founders Fund, the venture capital firm Thiel co-founded.
The Jerusalem event drew a roster of high-profile guests, including executives from Blackstone, venture capitalist Elad Gil, Keith Rabois of Founders Fund, Joe Lonsdale of Palantir and others. Former NBA player-turned-venture capitalist Omri Casspi also attended. Some of the visiting executives later met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Thiel, 56, co-founded PayPal in the late 1990s with Max Levchin and Elon Musk, serving as its CEO until its $1.5 billion sale to eBay in 2002. He went on to establish Palantir Technologies, a major data analytics company, and continues to serve as its chairman.
Through Founders Fund, Thiel was among the earliest investors in Facebook and has backed companies including SpaceX, Airbnb and Spotify. He also founded or co-founded Clarium Capital, Mithril Capital and his private firm, Thiel Capital. Bloomberg estimates his fortune at $24 billion, ranking him among the world’s 100 wealthiest people.
Thiel has recently resumed political activity in the United States after a two-year hiatus, though he has not directly contributed to Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. According to Business Insider, he recently donated to the Republican National Congressional Committee, the GOP’s main campaign arm for House races. The move marks a shift for Thiel, who previously spent tens of millions of dollars backing candidates during the 2022 midterm elections.