One day - I remember it was a Sabbath afternoon - I came to the synagogue with a book in my hand. I saw a commentary on the Bible by a certain Rabbi Moshe Dessauer, better known as Moses Mendelssohn. An elderly man came up to me - I was then maybe 10 or 12. "What are you studying?" he said. "Dessauer's commentaries," I said. So he gave me a slap on my face.

There are real people behind the [Bible] stories.

I have not lost faith in God. I have moments of anger and protest. Sometimes I've been closer to him for that reason.

The Pope going to Jerusalem, the Pope recognising the State of Islam, the Pope going to the wall organising a concert for the Holocaust in the Vatican, going to the synagogue in Vatican, and that happens in Protestant service as well. That doesn't mean that anti-Semitism disappear, but it is on certain level that Jews all the time, or with Christians, Catholics, Protestants, Jews, meeting all the time, studying together, signing petitions for all kinds of causes.

I was 15, not 14, when I was inside there [Auschwitz], 15, and for me both were actually a surprise.

Which is worse? Killing with hate or killing without hate?

Life is not a fist. Life is an open hand waiting for some other hand to enter it.