Reuters
BEIRUT - The Lebanese parliament overwhelmingly approved a national unity government Thursday that will allow Hezbollah to keep its weapons, despite strong criticism from pro-Western lawmakers angry at the militant group's refusal to disarm. Full Story »
AP
CAIRO - Egypt has been digging trenches and installing metal sheets underground along its border with Gaza in an apparent attempt to curb smuggling into the Palestinian territory through tunnels, Gaza border guards and area residents said Thursday. Full Story »
AFP/File
MOSCOW (AFP) - Palestinian foreign minister Riyad al-Malki on Thursday rejected holding Middle East peace talks in Moscow in the absence of preliminary negotiations with Israel. Full Story »
BRUSSELS - The European Union accused Israel on Thursday of trying to divide the 27-nation bloc to stop it passing a resolution calling for Jerusalem to be the shared capital of Israel and a future Palestinian state. Full Story »
AP
JERUSALEM - Israel's prime minister on Thursday offered additional funds and new social benefits to tens of thousands of Jewish settlers in a move seen as an attempt to soothe tensions over new restrictions on construction in the West Bank. Full Story »
AFP
CAIRO (AFP) - Residents of the Egyptian side of the border town of Rafah, a smuggling haven within tunneling distance of the Gaza strip, say engineers have begun a using heavy earth-moving equipment for a set of mysterious excavation works. Full Story »
AFP/POOL/File
DAMASCUS (AFP) - Syria warned Israel on Thursday it risked closing the door to renewed peace talks, a day after the Israeli parliament agreed to consider a bill that would make it far more difficult to return the occupied Golan. Full Story »
AFP/File
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israeli authorities said on Thursday they will send up to 40,000 doses of swine flu vaccine to the Gaza Strip, where six people have died of the virus in the past five days. Full Story »
AP
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - A healthy man in blockaded Gaza faked cancer, hoping the deadly disease would be his ticket out of the territory that has become an open-air prison for its 1.4 million residents. Full Story »
AFP/File
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel's premier wants to list some West Bank settlements as national priority zones and grant them 28 million dollars in credits, his office said on Thursday. Full Story »
WASHINGTON - A Palestinian shopkeeper and father portrayed as a terrorist in the movie "Bruno" is suing film star Sacha Baron Cohen, David Letterman and others for libel and slander. Full Story »
Reuters
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Thousands of Jewish West Bank settlers and their supporters demonstrated near the official residence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Wednesday to protest his 10-month building freeze. Full Story »
AFP
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Thousands of demonstrators rallied outside the Israeli prime minister's residence in Jerusalem on Wednesday to protest a 10-month moratorium on new building permits for Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank. Full Story »
AFP/File
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel's top court on Wednesday upheld a decision under which a Palestinian student was deported from Bethlehem to Gaza just two months before she was due to complete her bachelor's degree. Full Story »
Reuters
GAZA (Reuters) - Egyptian earth-moving machinery was at work on the Gaza Strip border on Wednesday and an Israeli newspaper said a project was under way to build a subterranean metal wall to block Palestinian smuggling tunnels. Full Story »
AFP/File
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt (AFP) - Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said on Wednesday a prisoner swap between Israel and Hamas was still stuck on the question of which prisoners Hamas wants in exchange for a captured Israeli soldier. Full Story »
AFP
JERUSALEM (AFP) - The European parliament demanded on Wednesday that Israel explain why it prevented a delegation of MEPs from travelling to the Gaza Strip despite initially authorising the visit. Full Story »
AFP
JERUSALEM (AFP) - The Israeli parliament on Wednesday passed the first reading of a bill requiring a referendum to approve a pull-out from annexed east Jerusalem and the Golan Heights as part of any peace deal. Full Story »
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