He was commander of the Drancy internment camp outside Paris from June 1943 to August 1944, from which nearly 24,000 people were deported. He was sentenced to death "in absentia" in France in 1954 for crimes against humanity. In 1961 and in 1980, Brunner lost an eye and the fingers of his left hand, as a result of letter bombs sent to him by the Israeli intelligence service, called Mossad.