The government would have preferred not to take a stand, but the constant presence of the Israeli-Arab conflict on our television screens made it an issue that could no longer be avoided.

Political rivals attacked me. I was savagely beaten. I was kicked in the face and I lost my eye as a result.

In recent years - before the intifada - there were three or four incidents of anti-Semitism a year, and that's out of 18 million crimes and violations of the law.

An ancient dictum says that when Zeus wanted to destroy someone, he would first drive him mad.

Im always suspicious of people who repent of other peoples sins.

My father was killed by a German mine, while I lost other relatives in Allied bombing attacks. The Second World War claimed tens of millions of victims. For some the most terrible aspect of it was the deportations, while for others it was the leveling bombings or the mass deaths by starvation and cold.

France was an occupied country, a country that surrendered and was left without the right to choose.