WASHINGTON - U.S. officials say Mideast envoy George Mitchell has delayed his latest peace mission to the region after Israel vowed to keep building in disputed east Jerusalem, despite international objections.
Mitchell had planned to leave Washington Monday for the Middle East, but delayed his departure, leaving the timing of his trip unclear.
The U.S. State Department […]

JERUSALEM - The Israeli military says it has arrested a senior commander of the Palestinian faction Hamas after he spent more than a decade on the run.
Israeli troops and the Shin Bet security service caught Maher Uda overnight Saturday near the West Bank town of Ramallah.
Uda has been on Israel’s most wanted list since the […]

JERUSALEM - Israel has imposed a security clampdown on Palestinians in Jerusalem and the West Bank amid fears of unrest.
Israel sealed off the West Bank for 48 hours, saying police had intelligence information that Palestinian youths would cause disturbances after prayers for the Muslim Sabbath on Friday. This Palestinian was turned away by Israeli troops […]

JERUSALEM - U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has promised Israel a “total” U.S. commitment to its security as Israeli and Palestinian officials prepare to begin indirect peace talks.
Biden was speaking in Jerusalem Tuesday after talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres.  Biden is making the highest-level visit by a U.S. official […]

JERUSALEM - Police had to respond to violence that erupted at a Jerusalem landmark sacred to both Jews and Muslims. 
Israeli police stormed into a hotly disputed holy place in Jerusalem’s Old City to disperse Palestinian stone throwers near the Mosque of Al Aksa and golden Dome of the Rock.  The mosque compound is a flash […]

JERUSALEM - Israel says it is extending an olive branch to Syria in a bid to end an escalating war of words.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sought to ease tensions with Syria by calling for a resumption of peace talks.
Speaking at the weekly Cabinet meeting here in Jerusalem, Mr. Netanyahu said “Israel wants peace agreements […]

JERUSALEM - Two barrels of explosives have been found on Israeli beaches, as the Palestinian militant group Hamas vowed revenge on Israel for the killing of one of its founding members.
Israeli security officials say the barrels were found Monday after they washed ashore near the towns of Ashdod and Ashkelon, south of Tel Aviv.  Bomb-disposal […]

JERUSALEM - Israel has submitted a report to the United Nations responding to allegations of war crimes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
In an official 46-page response, Israel dismissed the U.N.-commissioned Goldstone Report, which accused the Jewish state of war crimes during the Gaza conflict a year ago. The report, authored by South African jurist […]

JERUSALEM - In the coming days, Israel’s cabinet will consider an initiative to reinforce the Jewish State’s 240-kilometer border with Egypt.  The aim is to stem the flow of thousands of illegal migrants who Israeli officials say are crossing the porous border and entering the Jewish State.
The migrants are mainly from the African nations of […]

JERUSALEM - The stalled Middle East peace process is continuing to raise tensions between Israel and the United States.  Israel says Washington is blaming the wrong party.
Israel reacted angrily to a threat by the United States to impose sanctions on the Jewish state.  In an American TV interview, Middle East envoy George Mitchell said the […]

JERUSALEM - Israel has what security experts say is perhaps the world’s most effective system of screening air passengers.  Despite constant threats from Palestinian terrorist groups, no flight from Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport has ever been blown up or hijacked, and the airport has not been attacked since the early 1970s. 
This success is due […]

JERUSALEM - Three Palestinians have been killed in Israeli air raids in the Gaza Strip. The violence erupted as Gaza’s Islamist rulers face mounting pressure on two fronts.
Israel launched a wave of air strikes on Gaza, in retaliation for a Palestinian mortar barrage on a border terminal and the firing of a rocket. The army […]

JERUSALEM - An Israeli concession on Jewish settlements has prompted death threats against a senior official.
Security has been tightened around Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak after he received dozens of death threats. Security sources say the threats were made by Jewish militants who oppose the government’s partial freeze on settlement construction in the West Bank.
The […]

JERUSALEM - Israel plans to build nearly 700 new apartments in disputed East Jerusalem, defying demands by the United States and the Palestinian Authority for a freeze on settlement construction. 
While Israel has imposed a partial freeze on construction in the West Bank, government spokesman Mark Regev says that does not apply to Jerusalem, which Israel […]

JERUSALEM - Six Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in the deadliest violence in months.
Dozens of jeeps carrying masked Israeli commandos rolled into the West Bank town of Nablus before dawn and surrounded the homes of three Palestinian gunmen. After a standoff, troops stormed inside and killed the wanted men.
The army said they were […]

JERUSALEM - The Israeli military says its aircraft struck two factories in Gaza and a smuggling tunnel between the Gaza Strip and Egypt on Sunday.
Palestinian medics say the air assault wounded at least seven people. 
The Israeli military said the air attack was in response to a rocket fired Saturday by Palestinian militants into southern Israel.  […]

JERUSALEM - Palestinian leaders say they are pushing efforts to have the U.N. Security Council endorse the creation of a Palestinian state out of frustration over the stalled peace process. Israel has threatened to take its own unilateral steps if the Palestinians move ahead with plans for statehood on their own.
It was a swift and […]

JERUSALEM - A former American president who tried and failed to broker a final Middle East peace agreement is back in the region.
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton is visiting Israel to mark the 14th anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. “In the last 14 years, not a single week has gone by […]

WASHINGTON - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeated his call for an immediate resumption of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Mr. Netanyahu addressed a gathering of North American Jewish leaders in Washington hours before he was to meet with U.S. President Barack Obama.
Prime Minister Netanyahu expressed impatience to restart direct peace negotiations […]

JERUSALEM - Thousands of Israelis gathered at Rabin Square in Tel Aviv to mark the 14th anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. The demonstration took place at the site where Mr. Rabin was gunned down at a peace rally in 1995, by an Orthodox Jew opposed to his policy of trading land […]

JERUSALEM - Israel’s prime minister is accusing Iran of committing a war crime for allegedly trying to send an arms-laden ship to the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
Benjamin Netanyahu says the ship that Israel seized Wednesday contained rockets and other weapons that Hezbollah would have used to kill “as many civilians as possible,” as he put […]

JERUSALEM - Israel says it has seized an arms shipment on the high seas and it is pointing a finger at Iran.
Israeli naval commandos stormed onto a ship loaded with weapons near Cyprus and took it to Israel’s southern port of Ashdod. The vessel was flying an Antiguan flag and disguised as an aid ship. […]

JERUSALEM - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is calling on Israel and the Palestinians to return to negotiations as soon as possible. The top U.S. diplomat met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem and earlier with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Abu Dhabi as part of U.S. efforts to step up the […]

JERUSALEM - There was violence today at the most sensitive holy shrine in Jerusalem revered by both Muslims and Jews. At least 15 Palestinians were arrested, but there were no serious injuries.
Israeli police stormed into a disputed holy place in Jerusalem’s Old City and threw stun grenades to disperse Palestinian stone throwers. The clash took […]