As someone who makes a living as a social commentator, I'm used to taking bullets from those who disagree with me.

And with the advent of social media - a world of anonymous cyber warriors firing salvos from their bedroom bunkers - there's no holding back from how offensive or deeply personal that criticism can be. Most of the time I accept these as an occupational hazard. Anyway, I'm in the business of debate and everyone is entitled to a view. But this week, comments dripped into my Twitter feed which crossed a line. Put simply, I was described as a Nazi.

In fact, in order to labour the point, my correspondent also sent me a picture of Adolf Hitler. This prompted others to follow suit.

The trigger for this venomous tirade was a newspaper article I'd written in which I expressed support for the return of ID cards. Back in 2009 the then Labour government introduced non-compulsory cards for UK citizens, with those in my home town of Manchester becoming the first in the UK to be able to buy a biometric ID card - at a cost of £30. Seizing this as a convenient and safe way to prove identity, I happily bought one. However, there was robust opposition to the scheme - and in 2010 the new Coalition government scrapped the project. The cards were no longer valid and the national identity register, which held the personal details of everyone issued with an identity card, including photographs and fingerprint biometrics, was destroyed the following year.

Personally, I never really understood what the fuss was about. If you're a law-abiding citizen, what is there to lose? Such a scheme can only assist national security, welfare fraud and other criminal activity. Anyway, I probably surrender more of myself every time I use my supermarket loyalty card. Which is why I suggested, in my article, that during such troubled times - and especially with the vexatious issue of illegal immigration - that it was time for the government to revisit the scheme. And this time make it compulsory.

I realised there would always be those who would disagree with me - not least the civil libertarians who think offering information to the state is tantamount to martial law.

Yet I had made it clear in the piece that I was also a Jewish girl and understood the ''show me your papers'' undertones of an ID card. What's more, in Israel they are compulsory. Issued at birth, the number you are given remains unchanged and is hugely useful for everything from processing utility bills to battling government departments. In short, I made clear that my position on ID cards had been considered through the prism of my own culture and heritage. So to be called a Nazi, while spectacularly misinformed, also missed the point.

Yet there is something more than that which made this a deeply uncomfortable issue.

As a member of Manchester's Yom Hashoah committee, I'm part of the team responsible for organising the city's annual community-wide presentation. This year, it will take place on May 4 and already a great deal of time has been spent interviewing survivors and researching topics which will relate to the event.

Much of it makes for uncomfortable reading and listening. To sit next to a survivor, a number burned on his arm, as he relays the details of his wartime experiences , is to remind - as if we need reminding - of the wound which never heals.

Even though I am not second generation - my late parents were living in Britain during the war - I feel, as many Jews do, the global sadness and responsibility of preserving the memory of those who were murdered and honouring the survivors who we are privileged to still have among us.

But does being a Jew mean we are arm-locked from considering anything which relates to identity papers. How many times have you filled in a form which has asked for your religion?

In multi-cultural Britain we have so many ethnicities and we all surrender that information readily. Only the other week I was at a driver-awareness course and one chap even needed an interpreter. That's integration. Would his ID card have told us any more than we know already?

I suppose there are some redeeming features to the awful Nazi name-calling. It shows the heinous footprint of the jackboot still endures as the worst kind of insult among the wider population and that the murderous years of the Third Reich are not simply a footnote in history. On the other hand, it devalues debate about sovereignty and precludes discussion about anything which connects with identity.

Being called a Nazi hasn't changed my views on ID cards. The only thing it has done is make me wonder whether those who would smother my free speech and sensible debate with images of the Third Reich really are the Nazis here.