Berlin, April 5, IRNA -- Unfazed by personal attacks of the Zionist lobby, German Nobel literature laureate Guenter Grass on Thursday reaffirmed a nuclear-armed Israel was a threat to global peace.

Talking to the German Press Agency (DPA) in his home near the northern city of Luebeck, Germany's 84-year-old literary icon defended his latest poem published Wednesday in which he said that Israel -- as a nuclear power -- was 'endangering the already fragile global peace.'

'Yes, Israel is endangering the already fragile global peace,' Grass repeated his main point in the DPA interview.

Grass emphasized the poem was aimed at breaking a taboo by drawing public attention

to Israel's nuclear weapons arsenal.

Germany's most famous writer said earlier he long maintained silence on Israel's secret nuclear program because his country committed 'crimes that are without comparison,' but he has realized that silence as a 'burdensome lie and a coercion' whose disregard carries a punishment 'the verdict 'anti-Semitism' is commonly used.'

In one of the world's worst-kept secrets, the Zionist regime has reportedly turned into

a nuclear giant.

It is estimated to have hundreds of atomic weapons, an arsenal that ranks it

fifth among nuclear powers and dwarfs the programs of India, Pakistan and

North Korea.

Meanwhile, Grass slammed again the German government for its recent sale of another Dolphin submarine to Israel, branding it a 'disgrace.'

Israel currently has three Dolphin submarines from Germany — one half-funded and two entirely funded by Berlin — with two more under construction and the contract for

a sixth submarine signed last month.

The leftist author who won the 1999 Nobel Prize for his literary masterpiece 'The Tin Drum,' has faced the wrath of Germany's Zionist lobby for daring to openly criticize Israel's dangerous nuclear policies and its military threats against Iran