Poland has condemned a “racist attack” on its ambassador to Israel after he was allegedly spat at in the street, reigniting the diplomatic row between the two countries.

A 65-year-old Israeli architect, Arik Lederman, was arrested over the alleged assault on Marek Magierowski outside the embassy in Tel Aviv on Tuesday.

Police are now investigating the incident, which was described by Polish prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki as a “xenophobic act of aggression”.

The Polish foreign ministry also summoned Israel’s ambassador to Warsaw, Anna Azari, in protest.

It came amid an ongoing row over the Holocaust and requests for the return of Jewish property confiscated during the Second World War.

Remembering the Holocaust Show all 16 1 /16 Remembering the Holocaust Remembering the Holocaust 80,000 shoes line a display case in Auschwitz I. The shoes of those who had been sent to their deaths were transported back to Germany for use of the Third Reich Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Barracks for prisoners in the vast Auschwitz II (Birkenau) camp. Here slept as many as four per bunk, translating to around one thousand people per barracks. The barracks were never heated in winter, so the living space of inmates would have been the same temperature as outside. Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Sign for the Auschwitz Museum on the snowy streets of Oswiecim, Poland Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust The Gateway to hell: The Nazi proclamation that work will set you free, displayed on the entrance gate of Auschwitz I Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust A disused watchtower, surveying a stark tree-lined street through Auschwitz I concentration camp Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Stolen property of the Jews: Numerous spectacles, removed from the possession of their owners when they were selected to die in the gas chambers of Auschwitz Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust A sign bearing a skull and crossbones barks an order to a person to stop beside the once-electrified fences which reinforced the Auschwitz I camp Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust The peace and the evil: Flower tributes line a section of wall which was used for individual and group executions Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Life behind bars: Nazi traps set to hold the Third Reich’s ‘enemies’. In Auschwitz’s years of operation, there were around three hundred successful escapes. A common punishment for an escape attempt was death by starvation Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Burying the evidence: Remains of one of the several Auschwitz-Birkenau gas chambers Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust The three-way railway track at the entrance to Auschwitz-Birkenau camp. This was the first sight the new camp arrivals saw upon completion of their journey. Just beside the tracks, husbands and wives, sons and daughters and brothers and sisters were torn from each other. Most never saw their relatives again Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust A group of visitors move through the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp. Viewed from the main entrance watchtower of Auschwitz-Birkenau Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust "The Final Solution": The scale of the extermination efforts of the Nazis at Auschwitz-Birkenau can be seen by comparing the scale of the two figures at the far left of the image to the size of the figure to the left of the railway tracks' three point split Hannah Bills Remembering the Holocaust Each cattle car would transport up to one hundred people, who could come from all over Europe, sometimes from as far away as Norway or Greece. Typically, people would have been loaded onto the trucks with around three days food supply. The journey to Auschwitz could sometimes take three weeks. Hannah Bills

Relations between the two countries have deteriorated in recent months over accusations that Warsaw’s nationalist PiS government has tolerated a revival of antisemitic behaviour.

The dispute intensified in February after Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that "Poles cooperated with the Nazis” during the occupation.

Poland pulled out of a key European summit as a result and cancelled a visit by an Israeli delegation due to take place on Monday.

Mr Magierowski said the latest incident began when he was sitting in his car outside the Polish embassy in Tel Aviv.

A man “approached the vehicle of the Polish ambassador to Israel, opened the door and then spat”, said Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld.

Mr Lederman apologised for the incident at court, claiming he did not realise it was the Polish ambassador, but caused further outrage by accusing a security guard at the embassy of hurling antisemitic abuse.

“My family suffered the hardships of the Holocaust in Poland and I came to the embassy on the issue of restitution,” he said. “During that I was subjected to derogatory treatment by one of the embassy employees.”

He said he was walking away when “a vehicle came from behind me and honked at me loudly, frightening me. I expressed my anger in a way that I regret”.

Mr Magierowski described the claims about the security guard as ”bizarre”, tweeting: “Simply not true. He is a loyal, hard-working, well-trained and delicate person. Not a single complaint.​”

The suspect’s lawyer said the incident was “an almost Kafkaesque story” that had been ”blown out of proportion”.

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Israel’s foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon said: “Israel expresses its full sympathy with the Polish ambassador and shock at the attack. Israeli police currently investigating.

“We will update our Polish friends. This is a top priority to us, as we are fully committed to diplomats’ safety and security.”