The Israeli military has found the bodies of three missing teenagers, just over two weeks after they were abducted in the West Bank, allegedly by Hamas militants.

The Gaza-based Islamist group Hamas and president Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) have agreed to a unity pact, both sides announced in a joint news conference yesterday.

Palestinian militants barraged Israel with more than 200 rockets today, killing three people, as Israel pressed a punishing campaign of air strikes on militant targets across the Gaza Strip.

An American man who was in Israel for a Jewish work and study programme shot a chef dead at a Red Sea hotel and then killed himself in a shoot-out with Israeli commandos, police said.

A bomb exploded on a bus carrying Israeli youths in a Bulgarian resort today, killing at least six people and wounding 32, officials said.

A bus carrying Israeli tourists in a Bulgarian tourist resort exploded today, according to witnesses.

Israel has begun began the process of formally pardoning hundreds of Palestinian prisoners who are to be exchanged for an Israeli soldier held by Gaza militants for five years.

Israel has launched air strikes on Gaza after gunmen killed seven Israelis in a series of attacks near the border with Egypt.

IN a dramatic policy shift, Israel’s prime minister has agreed to negotiate the borders of a Palestinian state based on the ceasefire line that marks off the West Bank, a TV station reported yesterday.

An Israeli military attache to Moscow who was expelled from the country was carrying secret information when he was detained, Russia’s Foreign Ministry says.

Four people were reported to have been shot dead today when the Israeli military opened fire on a group of Syrians trying to cross the border along the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights.

A Palestinian who broke into the Turkish embassy in Tel Aviv trying to take hostages and demanding asylum was in Israeli custody today.

A Palestinian took hostages in the Turkish embassy in Tel Aviv today after shots were fired outside in an incident that appeared to have only an indirect link to recent tensions between the two countries.

Israel has admitted that its forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies in the 1990s, including from Palestinians, without permission of their families.

HAMAS militants yesterday traded a two-minute video showing an apparently unharmed captured Israeli soldier for 19 Palestinian women held in Israeli jails – the first tangible step toward defusing a key flashpoint in Israeli-Palestinian hostilities.

Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu may endorse a Palestinian state when he meets US president Barack Obama in Washington tomorrow, a minister said.

Israel increased the trickle of badly needed goods flowing into the Gaza Strip today, a military spokesman said, in the latest stage of a four-day-old truce with Hamas militants.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is suspected of illegally accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars from an American citizen, Moshe Talansky, Israeli media reported tonight.

At least seven people were killed when two gunmen entered the dining room of a rabbinical seminary in Jerusalem and opened fire tonight, police and rescue workers said.

Disgraced former President Moshe Katsav today insisted that he was the victim of a “campaign of incitement” and “false allegations", in his first public comments since signing a plea bargain that spared him a rape trial and possible prison sentence.

Israeli president Moshe Katsav has agreed to resign in a controversial plea bargain that drops rape allegations and the threat of jail time in return for admitting lesser charges.

Israeli authorities have decided to drop plans to pursue rape charges against president Moshe Katsav in a surprising plea bargain, Israeli media reported today.

Hamas militants today released a recorded message from captured Israeli soldier Cpl. Gilad Shalit, the first sign of life from the young serviceman since he was abducted exactly one year ago.

Two Katyusha rockets fired from Lebanon fell on northern Israel today, police and the military said.

Israeli aircraft struck four times in Gaza early today, the army said, killing one Hamas militant.

Israeli President Moshe Katsav has been notified that a draft indictment being prepared by Attorney General Meni Mazuz may include a second rape charge, the Israeli Justice Ministry said.

Israeli defense minister Amir Peretz, leader of Israel’s Labour Party, has chosen Arab MP Raleb Majadele to be a cabinet minister, Israeli media reported today.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas signalled he is giving up on forming a moderate government to replace the one headed by the militant Islamic Hamas, a decision that could spark violence or new elections – or both.

Israeli president Moshe Katsav today decided to skip the opening of the autumn session of parliament after police recommended he be indicted on rape charges.

President Moshe Katsav could face the most serious charges ever brought against an Israeli official after police recommended he be indicted for rape, aggravated sexual assault and other counts.

ISRAELI police have recommended that President Moshe Katsav should be charged with rape.

Israelis would vote Ehud Olmert out of office if elections were held now, polls indicated today, as the defiant prime minister defended his performance in the Lebanon war and lashed out at his critics.

A train packed with hundreds of passengers hit a pick-up truck in central Israel today, causing a locomotive and one carriage to overturn. Officials said 35 people were injured.

A train struck a utility truck in central Israel today, causing a locomotive and two carriages to overturn and injuring 150 people, according to television reports.

Doctors have admitted making a mistake when they treated then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon with large doses of blood thinners after a mild stroke, according to a TV investigation broadcast today.

ACTING Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said yesterday that Israel plans to withdraw from some of the territory it holds on the West Bank.

Israel’s acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said today that Israel will give up territory and relinquish control over most of the West Bank’s Palestinians, while holding on to main settlement blocs.

A SCAN of Ariel Sharon's brain showed improvement yesterday, and doctors will start bringing the Israeli prime minister out of his medically induced coma today, a hospital official said.

Doctors are to decide today when to begin bringing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon out of a medically-induced coma more than three days after he suffered a massive stroke – a key to assessing how much brain damage he has suffered.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was returned to the operating room today after a brain scan revealed he required more treatment following “massive, widespread” bleeding in his brain.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon today suffered a “significant” stroke with “massive bleeding” in his brain, a hospital official said.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was taken to hospital in Jerusalem tonight after feeling unwell while working in his office.

MPs from Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s new Kadima party held their first formal meeting today, sketching out broad policy goals including peaceful co-existence between Israel and a future Palestinian state, but stopping short of adopting a detailed party platform.

A major Palestinian militant group today declared it would fire no more rockets during Israel’s planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, after a deadly barrage inadvertently killed a three-year-old Palestinian boy.