Israel’s prime minister has demanded that any future Palestinian state be demilitarised and recognise Israel as the Jewish homeland, as he set out his starting position for new Middle East peace talks this week.

Israel and Egypt signalled a temporary easing of the Gaza Strip blockade today after widespread international condemnation of the deadly Israeli raid on an aid flotilla en route to the sealed-off Palestinian territory.

Three Palestinians were killed today in the second day of the Israeli army’s raid in the Khan Younis refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip, witnesses and hospital officials said.

Jordanian border authorities shot dead three armed men who were trying to sneak through the frontier into Israel today and detained a fourth man.

Princess Amalia, second in line to the Dutch throne, was baptised today in the presence of Queen Beatrix and her maternal grandfather from Argentina, who was permitted to attend a royal function for the first time.

A suicide bomber blew himself up at an Israeli village in the Jordan River valley near the West Bank early today, killing himself and an Israeli, police said.

The educational role of UNWRA the United Nations Works and Relief Agency that funds and staffs the schools in the Palestinian refugee camps established by Egypt in Gaza and by Jordan in the West Bank deserves urgent attention.