01/10/2011 | Argentina

Iran 'totally rejects' Palestine UN statehood bid

Iran's supreme leader rejected the Palestinians' UN statehood bid, saying any deal that accepted the existence of Israel would leave a "cancerous tumor" forever threatening the security of the Middle East.

01/12/2012 | World

Merkel reaffirms support for Israel after UN vote

German Chancellor Angela Merkel reassured Israel of her country's support, two days after Berlin disappointed the Jewish state by abstaining in a UN vote on the Palestinians' status.

06/12/2012 | World

Merkel says agree to disagree with Netanyahu on settlements

Germany's Angela Merkel and Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to disagree on the question of Israeli plans to build more Jewish settlements, the chancellor said.

12/12/2012 | World

Gaza perfume sales soar with rocket name

Sales of a citrus-scented perfume marketed in Gaza have soared since it was named in honour of the rockets that Palestinians shot at Israel during a war last month, the manufacturer said.

20/11/2012 | World

Meeting Clinton, Netanyahu demands 'long-term' Gaza deal

29/11/2012 | World

Palestinians win implicit UN recognition of sovereign state

The 193-nation UN General Assembly today overwhelmingly approved the de facto recognition of a sovereign Palestinian state after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on the world body to issue its long overdue "birth certificate."

30/11/2012 | World

Stung by UN defeat, Israel pushes settlement plans

Hours after the United Nations voted overwhelmingly to grant de-facto statehood to Palestine, Israel responded today by announcing it was authorising 3,000 new settler homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

20/10/2012 | World

Israel seizes pro-Palestinian activist ship off Gaza

The Israeli navy seized an international pro-Palestinian activist ship in the Mediterranean sea on Saturday to prevent it breaching its blockade of the Gaza Strip, a military spokeswoman said.

10/11/2012 | World

Gaza flares as Israel hits back killing four

Israeli tank fire killed four Palestinians and wounded 25 in the Gaza Strip after an anti-tank missile hit an Israeli army jeep wounding four soldiers, and Palestinian fighters fired rockets into southern Israel in a new flare-up of fighting.

12/11/2012 | World

Abbas says ready to start talks with Israel after UN upgrade

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas repeated an offer today to restart peace talks with Israel after a UN vote to recognise Palestine as an observer state later this month.

04/08/2012 | World

Palestinians to renew UN statehood drive next month

The Palestinians will next month renew a bid to upgrade their status at the United Nations, their foreign minister said on Saturday, a move which could strengthen their statehood claims after talks with Israel stalled.

25/09/2012 | World

'Door for Israeli-Palestinian peace may be closing,' Ban Ki-moon

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the "door may be closing, for good" on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, saying the continued growth of Jewish settlements undercuts peace.

14/10/2012 | World

Israeli air strikes kill 3 Palestinian militants in Gaza

Israel killed three Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, a day after two men identified as the most senior al Qaeda affiliates in the enclave died in an Israeli air strike as they rode a motorcycle.

04/04/2012 | World

Israeli and Palestinian prime ministers to meet

The Israeli and Palestinian prime ministers will meet later this month, officials said on Wednesday, but the rare talks may only sharpen differences that have brought peace negotiations to a standstill.

14/05/2012 | World

Palestinian inmates agree to end hunger strike

Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails agreed to an Egyptian-brokered deal aimed at ending a mass hunger strike that challenged Israel's policy of detention without trial and raised fears of a bloody Palestinian backlash if any protesters died.

08/06/2012 | World

Abbas offers Israel dialogue for amnesty, arms

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he was ready to hold dialogue with Israel if it freed prisoners and re-armed his police, but there could be no full peace talks without a freeze on West Bank settlements.

25/02/2012 | World

Palestinians clash with Israeli troops in West Bank

Israeli soldiers fired tear gas and rubber bullets at Palestinians who threw rocks and firebombs towards them in a West Bank clash that erupted after a funeral for a protester killed a day earlier.

10/03/2012 | World

Israel kills four more Gaza gunmen, rockets hit Israel

Israel killed four Gaza militants as violence sparked by the death of a militant leader a day earlier escalated with gunmen firing more than 90 rockets at Israel, injuring four people, Israeli and Palestinian officials said.

19/03/2012 | World

Obama calls Abbas to discuss Middle East peace

US President Barack Obama spoke to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for the first time in six months to discuss the long-stalled Middle East peace process, the White House said.

19/01/2012 | World

Israel arrests Hamas head of Palestinian parliament

Israeli soldiers arrested senior Hamas official, Aziz Dweik, speaker of the Palestinian parliament on suspicion of involvement with terrorist groups, the Israeli military and Hamas said.

01/02/2012 | World

UN Ban Ki-moon urges Israeli goodwill gestures to Palestinians

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged today Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to offer Palestinians goodwill gestures to keep peace talks alive.

02/02/2012 | World

Ban Ki-moon asks Israel to ease up Gaza blockade

UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon asked Israel today to ease up the blockade against the Palestinians after being received by protests crossing from Israel to Gaza.

02/11/2011 | World

US, EU deeply concerned with Israel on settlements

The United States is expected to voice deep disappointment at Israel's speeding up settlement building following UNESCO's decision to grant full membership to the Palestinians, a US official said today. The European Union had already expressed deep concern about Israel's decision today.

08/11/2011 | World

No consensus on Palestinian bid, UN report

A draft report by a key UN Security Council committee, obtained by an international news agency today, declared that members could not reach consensus on whether Palestine should be accepted as a UN member state.

02/01/2012 | World

Israelis, Palestinians to meet in Jordan

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators meet in Jordan alongside international mediators trying to revive their stalled peace talks, but neither side is raising hopes they can end more than a year of deadlock.

31/10/2011 | World

UNESCO gives Palestinians full membership

The United Nations' cultural agency said it would decide later today whether to give the Palestinians full membership of the body, a vote that could boost their bid for recognition as a state at the United Nations.

31/10/2011 | World

US cuts off UNESCO funding after Palestinian vote

The United States said it had stopped funding UNESCO, the UN cultural agency, following its vote to grant the Palestinians full membership.

01/11/2011 | World

Israel to speed up settlement building in West Bank

Israel decided to accelerate Jewish settlement building and withhold Palestinian Authority funds, moves likely to further hold up international efforts to revive peace talks.

24/09/2011 | World

Abbas sees UN taking weeks, not months on bid

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he expected the Security Council to finish debating his nation's application for full UN membership within weeks, not months.

03/10/2011 | World

Panetta urges Israel, Palestinians to negotiate

US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called for "bold action" today from Israeli and Palestinian leaders to achieve peace after cautioning that Israel was becoming increasingly isolated in the Middle East.

05/10/2011 | World

Palestinians take step towards full UNESCO membership

Palestinians moved a step closer to full membership in the UN cultural agency today after its board decided to let 193 member states vote on the issue later this month, the latest stage in a Palestinian campaign for statehood recognition.

21/09/2011 | World

Sarkozy proposes one-year Mideast peace map

French President Nicolas Sarkozy proposed in the United Nations today give the Palestinians status as an observer state while setting out a roadmap for peace within one year.

In a speech to the UN General Assembly, Sarkozy warned that a UN Security Council

22/09/2011 | World

Palestinians to push UN bid despite Obama, protests erupt

President Barack Obama told the United Nations yesterday there was no short cut to Middle East peace but Palestinians said they would press on with a request for UN recognition of their nascent state.

23/09/2011 | World

Israel’s Netanyahu: Peace impossible through UN resolutions

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the UN General Assembly that he was reaching out to the Palestinian people but cautioned that peace could not be won with a UN resolution.

21/09/2011 | World

Obama to meet Palestinian leader amid UN crisis

President Barack Obama will meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas today to urge him to drop plans to ask the UN Security Council to recognize a Palestinian state despite US and Israeli objections.

21/09/2011 | World

UN Assembly: Rousseff warns of devastating effects of economic crisis

Speaking today at the UN General Assembly, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff warned that a full blown economic crisis could be devastating for emerging countries as well as for the world’s largest economies.

21/09/2011 | World

Netanyahu tells Obama Palestinian UN bid doomed

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said today that direct negotiation was the only way to achieve a stable Middle East peace and the Palestinian effort to secure UN recognition of statehood "will not succeed."

19/08/2011 | World

Israel-Gaza violence intensifies after gun attacks

Israeli aircraft struck Hamas outposts in Gaza and Palestinians fired rockets into southern Israel as violence escalated following deadly gun attacks along Israel's porous border with Egypt.The first of more than 20 dead were eight Israelis killed on Thursday in assaults on a normally tranquil desert road.

16/09/2011 | World

Palestinians to seek full UN membership, says Abbas

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he would demand full membership of the United Nations when he goes to the UN General Assembly next week, setting up a diplomatic clash with Israel and the United States.

18/09/2011 | World

New York meetings open to avert Palestinian crisis

A last-ditch international push began in New York today to try to re-launch Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and avert a crisis over Palestinian statehood at the United Nations.

19/05/2011 | World

Abbas welcomes Obama call to renew peace talks

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas welcomed US President Barak Obama's efforts to renew talks with Israel that collapsed last year, a senior Palestinian official said.

24/05/2011 | World

Netanyahu says will give up some land for peace

Israel is prepared to make "painful compromises" for peace with the Palestinians, including the handover of land they seek for a state, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the US Congress.

14/07/2011 | World

Arabs League to seek full Palestine recognition at United Nations

The Arab League will apply to upgrade the Palestinians to full member status at the United Nations, according to a draft statement from a league meeting in Qatar today.

26/03/2011 | World

Gaza rockets hit Israel after lull in violence

Two rockets fired from the Gaza Strip landed in Israel after a brief lull in violence along a frontier where tension has risen this week.

28/04/2011 | World

Surprise Palestinian unity deal challenges Israel

Israel said a Palestinian unity deal would sabotage prospects for peace and stemmed from panic by Hamas and Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas over popular uprisings in Syria and Egypt.

15/05/2011 | World

Israel-Palestinian violence erupts on three borders

Israeli troops shot Palestinian protesters who surged toward its frontiers with Syria, Lebanon and Gaza, killing at least 13 people on the day Palestinians mourn the establishment of Israel in 1948.

18/02/2011 | World

US vetoes UN draft condemning Israeli settlements

The United States vetoed a draft UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements on Palestinian territory after the Palestinians refused to withdraw the Arab-drafted text.

19/02/2011 | World

Palestinians will not spurn US despite veto, Abbas

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he would continue to cooperate with the United States despite Washington's veto of a UN resolution condemning Israeli settlements on occupied land.

25/03/2011 | World

Gates becomes first US Defense Secretary to visit West Bank

Robert Gates became the first US Defense Secretary to visit the West Bank, meeting Palestinian leaders keenly aware of every little nod to their hopes of achieving statehood.

02/01/2011 | World

Israeli troops kill Palestinian at West Bank checkpoint

Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian who approached them at a West Bank checkpoint holding a bottle, the Israeli military and Palestinian officials said.

08/01/2011 | World

Israel envoy to discuss reviving peace talks in US

An envoy of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will travel to Washington next week to discuss ways to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, a statement from Netanyahu's office said.

14/02/2011 | World

Palestinian cabinet resigns

The Palestinian cabinet resigned and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad will select new ministers at the request of President Mahmoud Abbas, officials said.

14/12/2011 | Entertainment

Palestinian director overcomes politics to screen love story

It took Palestinian director Susan Youssef 10 years to overcome a political obstacle course before she was able to screen her heart-wrenching tale of doomed romance in Gaza at the Dubai International Film Festival this week.