Israeli leaders condemned remarks by European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton which appeared to compare the Toulouse victims to deaths in Gaza.

At a conference Monday in Brussels on Palestinian refugees, Ashton reportedly said: “When we think about what happened today in Toulouse, we remember what happened in Norway last year, we know what is happening in Syria, and we see what is happening in Gaza and other places.”

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, on a diplomatic visit to China, called on Ashton to retract her remarks.

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“Israel is the most moral country in the world and, despite the fact that we are forced to fight terrorists who operate from within the civilian population, the IDF does everything possible to prevent harm to civilians even though they are protecting terrorists. No army in the world has a higher moral standard than the IDF, who endangers its own soldiers to minimize the risk to civilians,” Lieberman said.

Minister Lieberman added that the children Ashton should be thinking about are the children of southern Israel, “who live in constant fear of rocket attacks launched from Gaza.”

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak also condemned Ashton’s remarks, calling them “outrageous and disconnected from reality.”

“The IDF is operating in Gaza with the utmost care in order to prevent hurting the innocent. I hope the E.U. foreign affairs commissioner realizes her mistake quickly and retracts her statements,” Barak said in a statement.

StandWithUs France, which provides information about Israel in cities and on campuses worldwide, called for Ashton to retract her statement or resign from her post.

“This was an insensitive comment which was pandering to the Palestinian group Ashton was with, and it is incredibly hurtful to the victims and to the French Jewish community”, said Laurent Preece, Director of StandWithUs France. “Her record regarding diplomacy and the Israeli-Arab conflict has been checkered at best, but these comments are beyond the pale. She should apologize immediately or resign her position.”

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