RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Jordan’s King Abdullah II paid a rare visit to the West Bank on Monday to show support for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, as the two moderate leaders try to engage with previously shunned Islamists now on the rise in the region.
UNITED NATIONS — Furiously scrambling to head off a U.N. showdown, the United States warned world leaders Wednesday that trying to create a Palestinian nation by simple decree instead of through hard negotiations was bound to fail as a shortcut to peace with Israel. Europeans worked to defuse the dispute, too, France urging new talks within a month. Undeterred, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas pressed toward a formal bid for U.N. recognition that could bring the issue to a head on Friday.
JERUSALEM — Gaza militants agreed to a cease-fire with Israel to stop three days of violence, a Hamas official said Sunday, after a deadly attack on Israelis near the Egypt-Israel border set off a round of Israeli airstrikes and rocket barrages from Gaza.
BEIRUT — Syrian security forces fired on thousands of protesters Friday, killing a teenage boy and at least 15 other civilians as accounts emerged of more indiscriminate killing and summary executions by the autocratic regime of President Bashar Assad, activists said.
Thousands of soldiers backed by tanks and snipers moved in before dawn to the city where Syria’s anti-government uprising began, causing panic in the streets when they opened fire indiscriminately on civilians and went house-to-house rounding up suspected protesters. At least 11 people were killed and 14 others lay in the streets — either dead or gravely wounded, witnesses said.