Professor Johan Galtung, a Norwegian sociologist who has been dubbed "the father of peace studies," has made a series of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel remarks, both at a lecture in Norway last year and in a recent article published in a Norwegian periodical that was also posted on its website.

Among Galtung's controversial remarks were claims that Jews control international media, which as a result are biased in favor of Israel and limit criticism of it; the suggestion that people should read the anti-Semitic tract "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," and even a possible connection between Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik and the Israeli spy agency Mossad, according to reports.

Galtung, 82, is a founder of the international Institute of Peace Research in Oslo and has helped establish the academic discipline of peace studies and conflict resolution.

Some of his controversial remarks were made during a lecture at the University of Oslo last summer, while others were part of his written response to an article published in April in a Norwegian periodical called Humanist that criticized him. He also repeated similar sentiments in a follow-up email exchange with Israeli daily Haaretz this week.

According to reports, Galtung believes Breivik chose July 22, 2011, to carry out the bombing of a government building in Oslo that killed eight people and the subsequent shooting attack at a youth camp in Utoya that left 69 people dead because it was the same date on which Jerusalem was liberated by the Templars in 1099. He also said that on the same date in 1946, "Jewish terrorists" from the Irgun bombed the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, and that some of those involved later became Israeli prime ministers.

He wrote in his response to the Humanist: "... all on the same day, 22/7. Random? Hardly .... It will be interesting to read the [Norwegian] police report about Israel during the [Breivik] trial."

Galtung suggested that Breivik, who is currently on trial for the massacre, has ties to the Freemasons, which he says has Jewish foundations. The sociologist also said he believes the Mossad may have given Breivik his orders.

In an email exchange with Haaretz on Sunday, Galtung wrote, “When we know nothing about who is behind Breivik, including whether there is anybody at all, any hypothesis is legitimate; that is in the nature of research." He continued: “I consider the Mossad highly unlikely, but it is illegitimate to eliminate it as a hypothesis with no evidence."

Galtung also made other controversial remarks in his response to the critical Humanist article. He claims that six Jewish companies control 96 percent of world media and recommends that people read “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion."

“I wonder how many people with such strong opinions on the book have even read it,” he wrote in his response to the Humanist piece. “It is impossible to do so today without thinking of Goldman Sachs."

Galtung's remarks were first published in Israel by Gad Yair, a sociology professor at Hebrew University, who wrote about Galtung in his blog last Thursday