Israeli action-hero Lior Raz has spoken of the emotional turmoil he faced while acting in his hit show Fauda.

In an exclusive interview with the JC, Raz said the process of acting brought up a lot of old trauma from his days in the elite Duvdevan unit of the IDF.

He said: “It has opened many wounds. For me it was through the acting, not necessarily through the writing or creating.

"For example, last season I was talking to a character in his grave. I started to cry and couldn’t stop for about half an hour. The crew just left me; I couldn’t stop because everything was coming out.”

Raz also told of how the process of filming the show ended up being an almost cathartic moment for him as he was forced to deal with the pain of losing his girlfriend to a terrorist attack when they were teenagers.

“It was the hardest thing that ever happened to me,” he says, referring to the 1990 attack that killed his then 18-year-old girlfriend.

He said: “I wouldn’t choose the word cathartic, but it was a healing process."

“You are dealing with things you’ve never dealt with. I didn’t talk about my army service for years. I didn’t talk about Iris either. When we were writing and shooting Fauda, I realised I was dealing with things I’d blocked out.”

Fauda season 4 will be available to stream on Netflix later this year.