Some months ago, when Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation recognised each other, I had a vivid recollection of the night of 14–15 May 1948, when Israel declared its independence. I was nine years old. I remember my father coming to my bed and lying beside me in the dark. ‘When I was a boy, I was beaten in school in Russia and then in Poland for being a little Jew’, he said. ‘You may still get beaten in school, but not for being a Jew. This is what the State of Israel is all about.’ In the darkness I could suddenly feel his tears. It was the only time in my life that my father cried in my presence.

The next morning, within hours of Israel's declaration of independence, five Arab armies invaded the country from all directions. The Jewish section of Jerusalem was besieged for several months, bombarded by Jordanian artillery from the east and by Egyptian forces from the south. What had been, since the beginning of the century, a neighbourly feud between Arabs and Jews turned that night into a major international war.

Twice in my life, in 1967 and again in 1973, I saw the face of war as a reservist soldier, first in Sinai and then in the Golan Heights. That experience turned me into a peace activist, but not into a pacifist ready to turn the other cheek to an enemy. If anyone tries to take my life or the life of my people, I will fight. I will fight if anyone tries to enslave us, but nothing short of the defence of life and freedom could make me take up arms.