1980s and 1990s In 1981, Lévy published ''L'Idéologie française'' ("The French Ideology"), in which he offers a dark picture of French history. It was strongly criticised for its journalistic character and unbalanced approach to French history by Marxism-critic
Raymond Aron. In the 1990s, Lévy called for European and American intervention in the
Bosnian War during the
breakup of Yugoslavia. He spoke about the Serb POW camps which were holding
Bosniaks. He referred to the Jewish experience in
the Holocaust as providing a lesson that mass murder cannot be ignored by those in other nations.
2000s Through the 2000s, Lévy argued that the world must pay more attention to the
crisis in Darfur. In August 2008, Lévy interviewed the President of Georgia,
Mikheil Saakashvili, during the Russia-Georgian War. In 2009, Lévy signed a petition in support of film director
Roman Polanski, calling for his release after Polanski was arrested in Switzerland in relation to his
1977 charge for drugging and raping a 13-year-old girl.
2010s In January 2010, Lévy publicly defended Popes
Pius XII and
Benedict XVI against political attacks directed against them from within the Jewish community. At the opening of the "Democracy and its Challenges" conference in
Tel Aviv (May 2010), Lévy gave a very high estimation of the
Israel Defense Forces, saying "I have never seen such a democratic army, which asks itself so many moral questions. There is something unusually vital about Israeli democracy." In March 2011, he engaged in talks with Libyan rebels in
Benghazi, and publicly promoted the international acknowledgement of the recently formed
National Transitional Council. Later that month, worried about the
2011 Libyan civil war, he prompted and then supported
Nicolas Sarkozy's seeking to persuade Washington, and ultimately the United Nations, to intervene in Libya, ostensibly to prevent a massacre in Benghazi. In May 2011, Lévy defended IMF Chief
Dominique Strauss-Kahn when Kahn was accused of sexually assaulting a chambermaid in New York City. Lévy questioned the credibility of the charges against Strauss-Kahn, asking
The Daily Beast, "how a chambermaid could have walked in alone, contrary to the habitual practice of most of New York's grand hotels of sending a 'cleaning brigade' of two people, into the room of one of the most closely watched figures on the planet." In May 2011, Lévy argued for military intervention in Syria against
Bashar al-Assad after violence against civilians in response to the
2011 Syrian uprising. He repeated his position in a letter to the
Weekly Standard in August 2013. On 9 November 2011, his book, ''La guerre sans l'aimer'', which tells the story of his Libyan spring, was published. , at the commemoration of the
Toulouse and Montauban shootings, 19 March 2015 In April 2013, he was convicted by a French court for libelling journalist
Bernard Cassen. In 2013, Lévy criticized the international community for their acts during the
Bosnian genocide. Levy travelled to Kyiv, Ukraine during the
Euromaidan in February 2014, actively promoting the events. In February 2015, he performed his play
Hotel Europa at the
National Opera of Ukraine on the first anniversary of the Euromaidan's toppling of the government of
Viktor Yanukovych. In April 2014, he visited
Bangladesh for the first time since 1972 to speak at the launch of the first Bengali translation of his first book
Bangla-Desh, Nationalisme dans la révolution ("Bangladesh, Nationalism in the Revolution", 1973), and to open a memorial garden for Malraux at Dhaka University. In December 2019, Lévy visited the
Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, where he met Kurdish fighters led by General
Mazloum Abdi.
2020s In July 2020, Lévy arrived on
Misrata Airport in Libya, then he met some
Government of National Accord officials; his visit was met with protests near
Tarhuna. Regarding
the war between Israel and Hamas, Lévy wrote as reported in the French newspaper
Le Figaro: "we need to say it again, the
death of civilians in Gaza is not a massacre" (translated from original French: "il faut le redire, la mort des civils de Gaza n'est pas un massacre.") He wrote in
WSJ: "A genocidal army doesn't take two years to win a war in a territory the size of Las Vegas. A genocidal army doesn't
send SMS warning before firing or facilitate the passage of those trying to escape the strikes. A genocidal army would not evacuate, every month, hundreds of Palestinian children suffering from rare diseases or cancer, sending them to hospitals in Abu Dhabi as part of a medical airlift set up right after
Oct. 7. To speak of
genocide in Gaza is an offense to common sense, a maneuver to demonize Israel, and an insult to the victims of genocides past and present." On 12 April 2024, after an investigation by Tunisian authorities, Lévy was accused of maintaining relations with Tunisian lobbyist Kamel Eltaïef and of having interceded to prevent the production of phosphate in Tunisia for the benefit of other countries in the region. He was also accused of having propagated "Masonic" ideology through charitable organizations and Tunisian personalities indicted in the case, in addition to working towards the normalization of relations between Tunisia and Israel and of being a "member of
Mossad", the Israeli intelligence service. The investigating judge considered that he had sufficient evidence to initiate proceedings. On 19 April 2025, he was sentenced
in absentia to 33 years in prison by a Tunisian court. In October 2024, Lévy signed an open letter written by the pro-Israel organization
Creative Community for Peace criticizing
boycotts of Israeli authors and literary institutions over the
Gaza war. The letter decried efforts to "demonize and ostracize Jewish authors across the globe". In February 2025, Lévy acknowledged that Europe could not depend further just on the United States and
NATO for defense, but advocated that Europe should fund and have its own army, under European command. In June 2025, the
New York Times described Lévy as "a French author and intellectual who has the ear of Mr. Macron", quoting Levy's advice to Macron that a
Palestinian state "can only be envisaged after Hamas has laid down its arms, its commanders in Gaza have gone into exile, and the people of the West Bank and Gaza have renounced their murderous dream of a Palestine stretching from the sea to the Jordan border". == Criticisms and controversies ==