Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni declared victory today in the Kadima Party leadership race by a narrow margin of 431 votes.

ISRAELI foreign minister Tzipi Livni won a clear majority in the Kadima party’s primary election yesterday, TV exit polls showed — placing her in a good position to become the first female leader in 34 years and sending a message that peace talks with the Palestinians will proceed.

Rivals for the leadership of Israel's ruling party are facing a vote today which will put the winner a step closer to leading the country.

Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert will step down immediately after his party chooses a successor this month, a confidant said today.

Israeli opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu today called for immediate elections in the wake of his rival Ehud Olmert’s decision to quit as prime minister.

Iran test-fired nine long and medium-range missiles today during war games that officials said were in response to US and Israeli threats, state television reported.

ISRAELI defence officials and political pundits rounded on deputy prime minister Shaul Mofaz yesterday after he threatened attacks against Iran, accusing him of exploiting war jitters to advance personal ambitions.

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.

Israel’s Cabinet approved the UN ceasefire deal after a stormy debate today, clearing a key hurdle to ending the month-long war in Lebanon, the government said.

AFTER three weeks of negotiations, Israel’s premier yesterday put together a coalition government that backs his plan to pull out of parts of the West Bank and draw the country’s final borders by 2010.

Israel today stood by its new policy of firing artillery shells at Palestinian rocket squads operating from populated areas in Gaza, even after a round killed an eight-year-old Palestinian girl.

An offshoot of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah Party has carried out its first suicide bombing against Israel since a February 2005 truce.

Newly-installed Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud Zahar said the United States is biased toward Israel, guilty of crimes against the Muslim and Arab world and is widening the rift between the American people and those of the Middle East.

Israel linked West Bank Palestinians with the al-Qaida network for the first time today when a military court charged two youths with receiving funds from the jihad group to carry out a co-ordinated double bombing in Jerusalem.

Egypt reported its second human case of avian flu today while Israel continued its precautionary culling of hundreds of thousands of birds.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday toured the devastated Jericho prison where Israel spirited away six prisoners, denouncing the raid as an ”unforgivable crime".

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz today banned all Palestinians from entering Israel during the coming Purim holiday, Israel’s Army Radio reported.

ISRAEL’S defence minister advised the incoming Palestinian prime minister yesterday to fear for his life if Hamas militants start attacking Israel again.

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz today said that the Islamic militant Hamas group’s prime minister-designate, Ismail Haniyeh, was not immune from an Israeli targeted killing.

Israel branded the Palestinian government a “terrorist authority” today and halted the transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars in tax money to it in reaction to Hamas taking control of the Palestinian parliament.

ISRAEL has ratcheted up the pressure on the Palestinian Authority by threatening to cut all ties if a prime minister affiliated to Hamas is chosen after parliament is sworn in this weekend.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak thinks Hamas militants soon to head the Palestinian government will succumb to international pressure and renounce their violent campaign against Israel, Israel’s Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz quoted him as saying.

Israel’s compulsory military service is to be gradually reduced to two years from the current three years in a move that would save millions of pounds a year, defence minister Shaul Mofaz said today.

A top Hamas official said the militant group will abide by past agreements Palestinian leaders made with Israel as it strives to create a ruling coalition after a stunning election victory.

ACTING Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert yesterday ruled out contacts with a Hamas-led Palestinian government until the Islamic group renounces violence, while his defence minister threatened to “liquidate” Hamas militants involved in attacks.

Israel will insist that Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas keep his commitments to disarm militants, the Israeli defence minister said tonight.

EUROPE and the United States are struggling to get Russia and China on board to crack down on Iran at a UN meeting next month as Israel said it would not tolerate nuclear capability for Iran.

Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz yesterday hinted that Israel is preparing for military action to stop Iran’s nuclear program, but said international diplomacy must be the first course of action.

Israel is blaming Iran and Syria for funding and planning the suicide bombing attack in Tel Aviv that wounded 20, Israeli officials said today.

ISRAEL is mobilising 4,000 police and soldiers to forcibly remove Jewish settlers from two unauthorised West Bank outposts, military officials said yesterday.

The hospital caring for Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon said early today that there was no change in his condition overnight, and doctors planned to bring him out of a medically induced coma.

Israel’s most tightly-guarded secret has nothing to do with its military might. It is Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s weight.

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz has quit the Likud party to join Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, another aftershock from the political earthquake Sharon set off when he formed his new centrist party.

ISRAEL yesterday clamped a closure on the West Bank and Gaza, banning virtually all Palestinians from Israel, in its first response to a suicide bombing that killed five Israelis outside a shopping centre.

Israel today arrested 15 militants and prohibited most Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza from entering Israel in response to a suicide bombing that killed five Israelis a day earlier.

Israel today clamped a closure on the West Bank and Gaza, banning virtually all Palestinians from Israel, in its first response to a suicide bombing that killed five Israelis outside a shopping centre.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will crush his former Likud Party in March elections, winning 37 of parliament’s 120 seats, while Likud would sink to nine seats from its current 40, a new poll showed today.

Ariel Sharon’s new party would sweep a March 28 election and crush the hard-line Likud Party he abandoned, allowing the Israeli prime minister to form a coalition with the dovish Labour Party, according to opinion polls published today.

Likud’s governing body met today for the first time since Ariel Sharon’s defection, hoping to pick up the pieces of a shattered party even as the race to succeed him dissolved into a fury of backbiting.

Ariel Sharon’s main allies launched their election campaign today, saying the prime minister’s new centrist party would push for a final agreement with the Palestinians and the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Israeli warplanes struck in Lebanon today in what Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz described as the largest-scale Israeli response to cross-border attacks by Lebanese guerrillas since 2000.

PRODDED by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Israel and the Palestinians agreed yesterday on details for opening the borders of the Gaza Strip and allowing freer movement for Palestinians elsewhere.

Israeli aircraft early today bombarded open areas and roads in northern Gaza that the military said Palestinian militants used to launch rocket attacks on nearby southern Israel.

Israel sealed its crossings with the Gaza Strip today after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed five people.