Top architect Daniel Libeskind has lashed out at Italy's leader Silvio Berlusconi, calling his policies "repulsive" and the prime minister a "xenophobe" who hates foreigners. Libeskind rejected Berlusconi's early comments that a plans Libeskind designed for a new Milan skyscraper were not manly enough and have a "sense of impotence."
In an interview, Libeskind declared, “In Fascist Italy, everything that was not ‘straight’ was considered ‘perverse art’…my tower is inspired by the work of Leonardo da Vinci and great Italian culture. [Berlusconi] does not have the time or intellect to study these. As an American and Jew brought up in Poland, I find Berlusconi abominable. His concept of nationalism, of closing borders and denying what’s different, is repugnant. He hates foreigners.”