Israeli education minister apologizes for remarks on gays

Israel's education minister has apologised for controversial remarks about homosexual "conversion therapy" and intermarriage among Diaspora Jews that drew widespread criticism in Israel and the US.

Rafi Peretz, leader of a small religious nationalist party, wrote in a letter to the head of the Jewish Agency on Tuesday that his likening of marriage between Diaspora Jews and non-Jews to a "second Holocaust" was "misplaced."