US President Barack Obama claims direct talks between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Israelis will end the Israeli occupation of 1967.

During the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel occupied the West Bank, including East al-Quds (Jerusalem), the Golan Heights in Syria, Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, and the Gaza Strip.

Iran's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast says Tehran is still waiting for a response from the Vienna Group.

Mehmanparast noted that the group -- which involves the US, Russia, France and the International Atomic Energy Agency -- is yet to pin down an exact date for the resumption of negotiations.

On the eve of peace talks between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Israelis, a poll shows two-thirds of Israelis support occupation in the West Bank.

Sixty-four percent of those questioned favored resumption of settlement construction in the occupied West Bank territories after a 10-month moratorium expires on September 26, according to the poll conducted by Gal Hadash Institute and aired on private Channel Ten TV station Wednesday.

Over 150 Israeli academics say they will no longer take part in cultural activities or lecture in the occupied West Bank settlement of Ariel.

In a signed petition, faculty members from universities across Israel vowed not to lecture or participate in any discussions in the illegal settlements area and voiced support for the theater artists who have said they would refuse to perform in this West Bank settlement.

President Barack Obama Wednesday opened long-odds Middle East talks, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to defy skeptics by forging a "once and for all" peace with the Palestinians.

Obama warned Hamas meanwhile that its "senseless slaughter" of four Israelis in the West Bank would not thwart his efforts, while slim hopes were tempered by persistent tension between Israelis and Palestinians over settlements.

A senior Israeli official says Tel Aviv will not accept East al-Quds (Jerusalem) as the capital of a future Palestinian state.

An aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday described al-Quds as the "undivided capital of Israel," saying that Tel Aviv will not the city to be divided, AFP reported on Wednesday.

Barack Obama, the US president, has met with Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, in the first of a series of meetings aimed at restarting direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

The two leaders gave brief public statements after the meeting on Wednesday. Both condemned the murder of four Israelis near Hebron on Tuesday night, which Obama called a "senseless slaughter".

Iran's Intelligence Minister Heidar Moslehi says Tehran is engaged in a "multifaceted and complicated" defensive war which has been imposed by the US.

"This is not a conventional military warfare, it is harder and more complicated than that," ISNA quoted Moslehi as saying on Wednesday.

Despite international calls for a permanent freeze on settlement expansion in the West Bank, the Israeli premier announces plans to resume the construction work within one month.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that he would not extend a 10-month partial moratorium on settlement construction which expires on September 26.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for the trial and punishment of the invaders of Iraq, saying such a move would end terrorism.

“Those behind such a wrong decision, which led to the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent people, must be punished,” Ahmadinejad said in an interview with al-Alam news channel on Wednesday.

In the largest arrest campaign since it took power in 1994, the Palestinian Authority, run by the Fateh party, sent security officers all over the West Bank Wednesday morning to arrest known members of the rival Hamas party, after Hamas' armed wing claimed responsibility for the killing of four Israeli settlers Tuesday night. According to the Palestinian Authority, at least 300 were arrested and taken to Palestinian police stations and prisons.

The United States has reportedly threatened to boycott Turkey's international military exercise, should Ankara refuse to invite Tel Aviv.

Washington's move came after Ankara excluded Israel from the countries invited to the "Anatolian Eagle" air drills, held annually since 2001 in central Turkey, Turkish newspaper Hurriyet reported on Wednesday.

The Iranian president says any Israeli-Palestinian peace talks are bound to fail as long as the main problems of the Palestinian nation remain unresolved.

“Tens of rounds of negotiations have been held for more than 30 years and tens of plans have been put forward but they have all failed,” President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in an interview with al-Alam news channel on Wednesday.

A few hours after Barack Obama, the US president, declared it is "time to turn the page" on the American-led war in Iraq, Robert Gates, the US defence secretary, said the effort there had been based on flawed premises.

"The problem with this war, I think, for many Americans, is that the premise on which we justified going to war turned out not to be valid," Gates told US soldiers and reporters during an unannounced visit Wednesday to Camp Ramadi in Iraq. "Even if the outcome is a good one from the standpoint of the United States, it'll always be clouded by how it began".

The Russian foreign minister dismisses sanctions against Iran as ineffective, saying Tehran's isolation would have regional consequences.

“It is obvious that sanctions against Iran won't be effective,” Sergei Lavrov said in the Moscow State University of Foreign Relations on Wednesday.

Sweden upholds rape charges against the Wikileaks founder, with the director of public prosecutions saying, they have "a reason to believe that a crime has been committed."

"Considering information available at present, my judgment is that the classification of the crime is rape," the prosecutions official Marianne Ny said in a statement, according to AFP.

Two months before the US midterm elections, a new opinion poll shows President Barack Obama's Democratic Party grappling with waning support.

According to the Gallup's national poll released on Monday, 51 percent of registered voters said they would vote for the Republicans while only 41 percent said they would vote for the Democrats.

The British families who lost loved ones in the Iraq war have been reacting angrily at Tony Blair's self-professed anguish over the carnage he created by joining the US-led war.

The former prime minister, in his memoirs A Journey, to be published Wednesday says he regrets “with every fiber of my being” the lives lost since the invasion.

The American death toll in Afghanistan this year has reached the highest annual rate since the start of the US-led invasion of the country nearly nine years ago.

A total of 323 US soldiers have so far been killed in Afghanistan during 2010, compared to 317 in 2009, according to figures published by the independent icasualties.org website, quoted by AFP.

An Iranian lawmaker has criticized acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas' decision to attend US-brokered peace talks with Israel in Washington.

"Abu Mazen's presence at the Americans' summit will only weaken the status of Palestinians. He should know that the US-Israeli plans will turn him into a puppet," Fars news agency quoted Head of the Palestinian Intifadha Faction of Majlis (Parliament) Mohammad Karami-Rad as saying on Tuesday.

Tel Aviv says it will track down those responsible for the killing of four Israelis in the occupied West Bank without "diplomatic restraint."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered his security forces on Tuesday to hunt the assailants, giving them the freedom to search for the attackers in Palestinian lands, AFP quoted his staff as saying.

US President Barack Obama announces the end of the country's combat mission in Iraq, repeating his predecessor George W. Bush some seven years ago.

"Tonight, I am announcing that the American combat mission in Iraq has ended. Operation Iraqi Freedom is over," he said on Tuesday.

Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, has held a series of one-on-one meetings with Palestinian and Arab leaders in advance of the first direct Israeli-Palestinian talks in more than 18 months.

Clinton met on Tuesday morning with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, and is scheduled to hold a meeting with Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, later in the day.

US plans to fortify its embassy in Iraq have raised new suspicion about the diplomatic outpost's purpose in the politically-gridlocked country.

The White House has reduced the number of its troops in Iraq to around 50,000 and said it would take all its forces out of the country by the next year. But Washington has also announced plans to increase the number of American security contractors, tasked with securing American diplomats and diplomatic facilities.

On Tuesday night, four Israeli settlers were killed just outside Kiryat Arba settlement near Hebron, in the southern West Bank, when Palestinian fighters allegedly fired at their car.

Bribery charges involving a top adviser to President Hamid Karzai has angered the Afghan leader and threatens to damage US relations with Kabul.

The recent arrest of Mohammad Zia Salehi, the chief of administration for Afghanistan's National Security Council, has risen tensions between the US and Hamid Karzai, AP reports.

General David Petraeus has said that the nine-year war effort in Afghanistan had been "under-resourced" until recently and warned that progress would be "slow" and "hard-fought."

In an interview with NATO's in-house TV channel, the commander of the United States and International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) General Petraeus said the US and NATO did not have "the organizations necessary" in place until last year, when a new comprehensive war strategy was launched.

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast has cautioned Israel's allies not to strengthen anti-Tel Aviv sentiments through their unwavering support for Israel.

"Countries backing this regime must know that continuing their support would only spread hatred for the Israeli regime in the minds (of the masses)," IRNA quoted Mehmanparast as saying during his weekly news briefing.

Swedish police has interrogated Julian Assange, the founder of whistleblower website Wikileaks, over molestation allegations, his lawyer says.

Leif Silbersky, Assange's defense attorney, said on Tuesday that his client has undergone questioning by the police for about an hour on Monday evening.

An Israeli organization intends to 'revise' the online encyclopedia Wikipedia based on 'national and ethnic interests,' according to the IranianUK.com website.

"Wikipedia has turned into a key source for Israeli citizens and all of them refer to it," reported the website.

The Director of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) says the country has not yet received any official response from the Vienna Group over Tehran's proposal on resumption of talks.

"We have not received an official response, yet, from the (Vienna) Group on resumption of negotiations, but we have expressed our readiness to continue dialog," AEOI chief Ali-Akbar Salehi told IRNA on Tuesday.

Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) says Israel has no fate other than annihilation, urging a massive turnout in World Quds Day rallies.

"Incontrovertibly, the fake and inhuman Zionist regime has no other destiny than annihilation and destruction," the IRGC said in a statement on Tuesday, according to Fars News Agency.

Nine years into the war in Afghanistan, Commander of US and NATO forces General David Petraeus says the Taliban have spread their influence in the war-ravaged country.

Speaking in an interview with foreign media in Kabul on Tuesday, Gen. Petraeus said despite the rising number of casualties, foreign forces should take political as well as military action to wipe out the "industrial-strength insurgency."

"There was no justification for the flotilla, because there was no humanitarian crisis in Gaza," Israel Defense Forces Maj. Gen. Eitan Dangot told the Turkel Committee on Tuesday.

Dangot, the coordinator of government activities in the territories, told the committee that Gazans have all the goods necessary to maintain a basic lifestyle.

Barack Obama, the US president, has announced broader financial sanctions against North Korea as part of a punishment over the sinking of the South Korean warship earlier this year.

Obama on Monday signed an executive order that added one North Korean citizen and three firms to the list of frozen US assets, in addition to three citizens and five state entities under existing sanctions.

Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, has praised the drawdown of US troops from his country and called Tuesday a "bright day for the people of Iraq".

Al-Maliki spoke during a televised address hours before what US commanders say is the formal end of combat operations in Iraq.

The withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan from next July will begin with a general "thinning out" of forces rather than any large-scale drawdown, the commander of U.S. and NATO forces said on Tuesday.

Critics say U.S. President Barack Obama's strategy to begin pulling out troops has backfired, sending a signal to the Taliban that the United States was preparing to wind down at a time when U.S. and NATO forces were suffering record casualties. Five U.S. soldiers were killed on Tuesday, capping a bloody four days.

Israeli Arab MK Hanin Zuabi testified before a United Nations panel probing Israel's deadly raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla in May, telling the panel that commandos who boarded the ships intended to kill, Army Radio reported on Tuesday.

"The naval commandos arrived at the Mavi Marmara with the intent to kill," Zuabi was quoted as telling the UN panel.

The Iranian foreign minister says any country which attacks Iran will regret it, adding Iran is set to safeguard its inalienable rights.

"No one can ignore the rights of a nation," Manouchehr Mottaki said in an interview with German weekly magazine Der Spiegel, according to Fars News Agency.

The Israeli regime says it will release one of its army men who killed a young British peace activist before he has completed his prison term.

According to a report by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Taysir Hayb who took the life of British peace activist Tomas Hurndall in Gaza Strip in 2003 will be released from prison within one month.

As the US prepares to pull out from Iraq, figures released by the US Congressional Budget Office (CBO) show the cost of the US-led war stands at $709 billion in the past 8 years.

The cost, published in the CBO's Budget and Economic Outlook, comprises of military expenditure, including training of Iraqi forces and diplomatic operations.

US Vice President Joe Biden has traveled to Iraq as Washington prepares to officially end its so-called combat mission in the violence-stricken country.

Biden landed in Baghdad on Monday, one day before an August 31 deadline when a speech by US President Barack Obama will signal an end to the American military's combat operations, AFP reported.

Acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas has secretly met with Israeli defense minister amid warnings at home against resuming direct talks with Israelis.

Abbas held talks with Ehud Barak on Sunday during a clandestine meeting in a private home in Amman, AFP quoted Israeli media reports as saying on Tuesday.

Palestinian lawmaker Mustafa Barghouthi has urged acting Palestinian Authority (PA) Chief Mahmoud Abbas to reconsider his decision to engage in direct talks with Israel.

Speaking at a press conference in Ramallah on Monday, Barghouthi warned the PA against emboldening Tel Aviv by making concessions in upcoming negotiations, Ma'an news agency reported.

The upcoming Washington-brokered “peace” talks between Israel and the Palestinians serve the United States policies, says an American journalist.

The two sides have agreed to resume direct talks in the US capital on September 2. The Palestinian Authority (PA) quit the negotiations after Tel Aviv launched all-out war on the Gaza Strip, killing more than 1,400 Palestinians at the turn of 2009.

The United States plans to strike a 60-billion-dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia, the largest foreign arms sale by the United States.

The deal adds 30 billion dollar worth of Apache and Black Hawk attack helicopters to a package that already included 84 F-15 fighter jets.

The German government has censured controversial remarks made by a board member of the country's federal bank that stereotype Muslims and Jews.

During the promotion for his book Germany Abolishes Itself, Bundesbank member Thilo Sarrazin had stated that Muslim immigrants refuse to integrate and are a drain on society.

The United States government faces legal action for ordering the assassination of American citizens, whom it accuses of terrorist links.

On Monday, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights filed the lawsuit, protesting the death warrants including the one, signed by the country's President Barack Obama, against Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born cleric, who is identified by the White House as an al-Qaeda leader, Reuters reported.

A senior Iranian commander has rapped former US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton for his 'nonsensical' war rhetoric against the Islamic Republic.

Brigadier General Seyyed Masoud Jazayeri, the deputy head of Iran's Armed Forces Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Bolton and has still kept his "notoriety for idiotic remarks," Mehr news agency reported on Monday.

Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi says fuel for the Tehran research reactor will be produced within a year.

He also stressed the country's need for 20 percent-enriched uranium required for civilian purposes and noted that Iran has been forced to produce 20 percent-enriched uranium for medical and therapeutic purposes, IRNA reported him as saying on Monday.

Israel has decided to deprive six ailing Palestinian prisoners of direly-needed medical care and place them under strict confinement.

The Israeli prison service has chosen to move those affected from Israel's Ramleh Prison Hospital to central prisons.

A record number of people are living on government handouts in the US, as one out of six Americans now gets various anti-poverty supports, including food stamps.

A survey of state data by daily USA TODAY released on Monday showed that more than 50 million Americans are on Medicaid -- the federal-state program designed mainly to help the poor. That is an increase of at least 17 percent from December 2007, when the economic recession started.

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on Monday forecast a "moment of reckoning" in the coming weeks when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is forced to explain what kind of state he has in mind for the Palestinians.

The Palestinians are set to resume direct negotiations with Israel in Washington on Thursday. They will be the first direct talks in 20 months and are the result of painstaking U.S. diplomacy aimed at reviving the peace process.

Lebanon's resistance groups, along with Iran must stand together to thwart what he called foreign aggressors, Iranian ISNA news agency quoted Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as saying on Monday, adding that such an alliance would work against the "enemies of humanity."

Speaking during a meeting with the Lebanon-based Palestinian militant group Amal in Tehran, Ahmadinejad said that "Iran and Lebanon share heavy responsibilities and missions against Arrogant powers and enemies of humanity."

Any Israeli military move against the Islamic republic will be the regime's final criminal act in the Middle East, says Head of Iran's Quds and Intifadha Headquarters.

"Israel is never able to carry out its threats because any action against the Islamic Republic will be Israel's last criminal measure in the Middle East region," Iran's Labor News Agency quoted Ramazan Sharif as saying on Monday.

Seven more American soldiers have been killed and several others injured in another deadly day for US troops in war-torn Afghanistan.

The soldiers were slain in two separate bomb attacks in the country's volatile south, NATO said in a statement.

The Bolivian President Evo Morales has called for concerted efforts of Iran, Venezuela and Bolivia to put an end to the unilateralism dominant in the world.

"People in the world are suffering from the unilateralism of big countries that have filled the markets with their products," Morales said in a meeting with Iranian Minister of Industries and Mines Ali Akbar Mehrabian on Monday.

Iraq's military forces are fully capable of providing stability and security in their country, says Iran's ambassador to Baghdad Hassan Danaifar.

"Some people want to link the rise of violence and terror in Iraq to the withdrawal of US forces," Danaifar said on Monday.

The Syrian army and Lebanese resistance movement of Hezbollah would fully cooperate, should Israel launch a military aggression in the region, a report says.

The two sides have formed a joint headquarters in order to orchestrate the coordination between the two military forces, unnamed sources told the Kuwaiti newspaper al-Rai.

The UN investigators have arrived in Jordan to probe Israel's deadly attack against an international Gaza-bound aid convoy that killed nine Turkish activists.

The investigators interviewed four Jordanian activists who were on board the Mavi Marmara ship that came under attack by Israeli commandos.

Less than a week ahead of the US-backed talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA), Tel Aviv insists on resuming its West Bank settlement expansions.

In November, Israel announced a 10-month freeze on West Bank settlements which excluded the projects in east al-Quds (Jerusalem) and allowed construction of schools, synagogues and 'community centers.'

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has been accused of forcing out an anti-corruption lawyer in an attempt to block probes at the highest government levels.

Fazel Ahmed Faqiryar, a former deputy attorney general, said investigations of more than two dozen senior Afghan officials, including cabinet ministers, ambassadors and provincial governors, were being held up or blocked outright by Karzai, and Attorney General Mohammed Ishaq Aloko, the British daily the Guradian reported on Monday.

Acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas says if the upcoming direct talks with Israel fail over its settlements, only Tel Aviv will be to blame.

"Israel will be held accountable for the failure of the talks if settlement construction should continue," Abbas said in a televised speech on Sunday, the Israeli daily Ha'aretz reported on its website.

Israeli military jets have been observed patrolling the skies above southern parts of Lebanon in a flagrant violation of UN Security Council resolutions, the Lebanese army says.

The Lebanese military issued a statement through the National News Agency, saying that it observed an Israeli reconnaissance plane flying over southern Lebanon for about 17 hours.

Washington has criticized Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef over remarks that Palestinians should perish from this world.

"We regret and condemn the inflammatory statements by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef," US State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said on Sunday.

The Secretary General of the Arab League Amr Moussa says he has little hope that the forthcoming direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority will be successful.

"We are hoping that talks will succeed but we are all very pessimistic about the viability of the peace process because of the past experience," Moussa told Reuters on Sunday in an interview on the sidelines of a political conference in Slovenia.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says corrupt monarchies and hegemonies with huge military spending are "the source of all global crises."

"Corrupt powers are not qualified to govern the international community neither theoretically nor practically," Ahmadinejad said on Sunday.

Britain's trade unionists will vote on a resolution next month at their annual conference, condemning Israel for stepping up its atrocities in the occupied Palestinian territories.

The resolution to be adopted by Britain's six-and-a-half million trade union members at thier conference in Manchester, northwest England, condemns Israeli-imposed siege on the Gaza Strip where the living conditions are increasingly being deteriorated for more than 1.5 million impoverished people living in the impoverished territory.

The Afghan President has called for a change in the US war strategy in Afghanistan as Taliban militants make a dramatic comeback in the war-ravaged country.

"The strategy of the war on terrorism must be reassessed," Afghan President Hamid Karzai was quoted as saying on Sunday in a statement released by his office.

The chief Palestinian negotiator has urged worldwide condemnation of Israel's genocidal figures after a top Israeli clergyman wished all Palestinians dead.

Referring to the Palestinians, the founder and spiritual leader of Israel's ultra-orthodox Shas party, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef said on Saturday, "All these evil people should perish from this world," Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz reported.

Tony Blair tried to extend his term as prime minister after George W. Bush voiced “grave doubts” about Gordon Brown, White House sources have revealed.

The Sunday Telegraph reported that Blair had been asked by White House officials to prevent Brown from coming into office, after a meeting between Brown and then US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice whereby Brown apparently “harangued” her over policy issues.

Thousands of people have poured into the streets in different cities across the Indian-administered Kashmir to protest New Delhi's rule over the disputed region.

On Sunday, demonstrators defied a strict curfew to hold a pro-independence rally in the capital city of Srinagar.

As Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) prepare for direct talks, the US has reportedly envisioned a 10-year peace plan for the Middle East. 

US President Barack Obama is to visit Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory of the West Bank in the coming months to push for the 10-year peace plan proposal, Israeli news website Ynet reported on Friday.

Iran's Parliament (Majlis) Speaker Ali Larijani has voiced concern over the dire situation of Palestinian children and adolescents held in Israeli jails.

“The difficult situation that Palestinian children and teenagers are dealing with in Israeli prisons is indicative of their innocence," IRNA quoted Larijani as saying on Sunday.

English Defence League supporters gathering in Bradford city centre turned violent after the far right group supporters climbed up the barricade garden and started throwing smoke bombs , cans , stones and bottles and insulting the opponents including Muslims.

Despite the threat posed by the EDL demonstrators , police has so far fell short of containing the violence against Muslims and other ethnic minorities . only 5 people has been arrested while the fanatic supporter wearing balaclavas started trashing local property, stealing police gear and swearing Islamic values

Iran's new ambassador to Iraq says high on his agenda is to settle the remaining issues in mutual relations such as the Algiers Accord and common oil fields.

"Among the most significant issues on the agenda …are to … settle the remaining cases from the past such as the 1975 (Algiers) Accord , common oil fields and the like, …to upgrade the current level of ties and institutionalize them by creating the necessary understanding and signing relevant agreements between the two sides," Hassan Danaifar was quoted by the Mehr News Agency as saying on Sunday.

A former spy has revealed that British intelligent services carried out assassinations during the Cold War.

In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph's Seven magazine, John le Carre, the novelist and former secret agent who worked for both MI5 and MI6 during the 1950s and 1960s, said: “''Certainly we did some very bad things. We did a lot of direct action. Assassinations. Although I was never involved.''

As the US expresses optimism about future talks on Iran's nuclear program, Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani says Tehran has never refused nuclear talks.

US State Department spokesman P J Crowley on Thursday said the United States is hopeful that talks between Iran and P5+1 - Russia, China, France, Britain and the US as well as Germany -- and with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Tehran's nuclear issue will be held in the next few weeks.

Amid strained relations between Tehran and Washington, Iran says it will enter talks with the US only under "equal and respectful conditions" and without any prejudice.

"If the US seriously seeks to revive relations with Iran, it should make changes in its attitude. Washington should prove that it will never repeat previous mistakes and will not pursue misguided and hostile policies towards the Iranian nation," Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said.

Pakistan's former President Pervez Musharraf is all set to make a return to the country's political scene in the next couple of months despite court cases against him.

Musharraf, who has mostly lived in London since he lost power in the 2008 elections, held several meetings with Pakistani politicians and think tanks to discuss his future plans, a Press TV correspondent reported on Saturday.

Jordan has been censured for accepting an invitation to participate in the upcoming direct peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

"Jordan's participation in the meeting implies giving up the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes," Jordan's Trade Unions Council said in a statement on Saturday.

The spiritual leader of Israel's ultra-orthodox Shas party has wished death for all Palestinians, including acting Palestinian Authority chief Mahmoud Abbas.

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef made the controversial remark during his weekly sermon at a synagogue on Saturday, the Israeli daily Haaretz reported.

The senior military adviser to the Leader of the Islamic Revolution cautions against US warmongering policies in the Middle East that would likely lead to its "heavy defeat".

The US will endure a heavier defeat in Afghanistan than what it experienced in the Vietnam war, said Brigadier General Yahya Rahim Safavi on Saturday.

Dozens of Israeli actors and actresses have refused to perform at the Ariel settlement, which is the fifth largest Israeli settlement in the West Bank.

In a letter to the directors general of Israeli theaters on Friday, 36 prominent theater performers said that they would boycott any event held in the Ariel facility, as working there would be “against their consciences,” the Jerusalem Post reported.

A huge rally of US conservatives in Washington has drawn criticism from progressive groups as it has coincided with the anniversary of a civil rights event.

At the "Restoring Honor" rally, about 100,000 conservatives and advocates of the Tea Party movement gathered at the Lincoln Memorial on Saturday to, as the organizers of the event said, honor US principles.

Iranian Ambassador to Japan Abbas Araqchi has reiterated the Islamic Republic's support for the emergence of a nuclear-free Middle East.

Addressing the 22nd UN Conference on Disarmament Issues in the Japanese city of Saitama on Friday, the Iranian diplomat highlighted Iran's readiness to cooperate for its realization, IRNA reported.

The European Union says it will not take part in the upcoming US-sponsored peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) in Washington.

A spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said on Saturday that she will be in Beijing meeting with Chinese leaders on Thursday, when the negotiations are to start.

The Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) has staged a rally to protest the resumption of direct talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel.

Officials and supporters of the leftist Palestinian faction held a demonstration in Gaza City on Saturday to condemn the upcoming direct negotiations with Israel "in compliance with Israel and US preconditions," the Ma'an news agency reported.

Israel is reportedly preparing to strike arms depots and weapons manufacturing plants in Syria, claiming they belong to the Islamic resistance movement Hezbollah, a report says.

Tel Aviv has escalated its military presence in the occupied Golan Heights and the northern part of the Shebaa Farms, the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz said, citing a report in the Saturday edition of the Kuwaiti daily Al Rai.

Speeches by certain public speakers covered by US media have been giving rise to Islamophobia in the Unites States, a senior member of the Council on American-Islamic Relations says.

Speaking in an interview with Press TV, legislative director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Corey Saylor hit out at US media for making Muslims feel increasing alienated and insecure in the society.

Hundreds of Afghan people have held took to the streets in the eastern province of Ghazni to protest against the presence of private security firms in the country.

Over 500 protesters condemned the killing of two Afghan civilians by mercenaries in the region, a Press TV correspondent reported on Saturday.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has condemned US media reports alleging that senior members of the Afghan administration had been receiving secret payments from the CIA.

The office of President Karzai issued a statement on Saturday, saying that such allegations were aimed at diverting public attention from the greater priorities of the Afghan war.

NATO says 24 militants have been killed and five others have been arrested after the Taliban launched an attack on two major US bases in Afghanistan.

The raid targeted US-run Forward Operating Base Salerno and Chapman in the eastern Afghan province of Khost located near the border with Pakistan.

The New Delhi government has deployed more police and paramilitary troops in Indian-administered Kashmir to prevent demonstrations against the Indian rule.

The Indian troops erected iron gates and barbed wire barriers to seal off flash points of demonstrations in the Muslim-majority region.

Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro has said al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is a US agent used by former US President George W. Bush to scare the world.

"Any time Bush would stir up fear and make a big speech, bin Laden would appear threatening people with a story about what he was going to do," Castro said on Friday, AP reported.

Hundreds of critically-ill patients in the impoverished Gaza Strip are unable to receive their required medical treatments due to Israel's crippling siege.

The 1.5 million people of the coastal enclave have been under a blockade by Israel since 2007.

Pakistan rejects fears of Taliban attack on foreign aid workers helping the authorities in providing relief to the victims of the worst floods in the country's history.

“No such warning has been issued by the Taliban and they cannot target aid workers,” Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Friday. “However, if such an attempt is made, the government has the capability to deal with them," he added.

Iran has criticized the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for adopting a double standard in dealing with countries' nuclear programs.

Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali-Akbar Salehi said that the IAEA was not taking a balanced approach toward countries' nuclear programs.

The Iranian parliament speaker says Israel is on the decline today, adding a new era has emerged where all conflicts are to the detriment of Israel.

"Israeli soldiers are as scared of death as struggling popular forces welcome it," the IRIB quoted Ali Larijani as saying at a conference on unity among students in the Muslim world.

Up to 30 Taliban fighters, including suicide bombers, have attacked two US bases in Afghanistan's east.

At least six Taliban fighters were killed and several Nato soldiers wounded in the pre-dawn attacks on Saturday, officials told Al Jazeera.