Moussa said: "The matter is very serious. We get a lot of criticism and talk of anti-Semitism in Egypt."

Yet rather than address the issue, Moussa went on to say: "Of late we heard one of the rabbis in Israel attacking Arabs and accusing them of being snakes, and that God regretted having created them. Another former minister, Rafael Eitan, said that Arabs are like cockroaches."

Peres kept his composure throughout the press conference during which he was asked about settlements and Israel's "excessive use of force."

Ayelet Yehiav, spokeswoman at the Israeli Embassy in Cairo, said that although Al-Arabi is a relatively small opposition weekly, terms like "Nazi" and "fascist" are commonly used in the Egyptian mainstream press in reference to Israel.