Mansour Abbas broke a longstanding taboo when he led his Arab party into Israel's governing coalition last year. The bold move appears to be paying dividends.
Abbas, a once obscure politician, is the linchpin of the shaky union, securing hefty budgets and favorable policies for his constituents and even winning an audience with the king of Jordan.

A senior U.N. official said she is pushing for Libya to hold elections by June after the county missed a December deadline to elect its first president since the 2011 ouster and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi.
Stephanie Williams, the U.N.'s special adviser on Libya, told The Associated Press late Sunday that it is still "very reasonable and possible" for the country's 2.8 million voters to cast their ballots by June in line with the U.N.-brokered 2020 roadmap.

Three people were killed in a suspected drone attack that set off a blast and a fire in Abu Dhabi on Monday, officials said, as Yemen's rebels announced military operations in the United Arab Emirates.
Two Indians and a Pakistani died as three petrol tanks exploded near the storage facility of oil giant ADNOC, while a fire ignited in a construction area at Abu Dhabi airport.
Israeli police were in a standoff Monday with a Palestinian man who carried a gas cannister on the roof of his home in a Jerusalem flashpoint as his family faced eviction.
Israeli media reported that Mohammed Salhiya had threatened to set himself on fire if the eviction order from Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem was carried out.

Jordan's military has said that an army officer was killed in a shootout with smugglers on the country's northern border with Syria.
A Jordanian military website said Capt. Muhammad Yassin Musa al-Khudayrat was killed and three others were injured when a group of smugglers opened fire on border guards.

Egyptian authorities have announced the arrest of a prominent member of a U.S.-designated terrorist group. According to government media, the suspect was detained after a Turkey-bound flight from Sudan that he was on made an emergency landing in Egypt.
The Interior Ministry said in a statement that a man, identified as Hossam Menoufy, had been arrested earlier in the week but did not provide further details.
The U.N. Security Council has condemned the seizure of a United Arab Emirates ship and demanded that Yemen's Houthi rebels immediately release the vessel and its crew.
A press statement from the U.N.'s most powerful body called on all sides "to resolve the issue quickly and underlined the importance of freedom of navigation in the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea, in accordance with international law."

China said Friday it gained support on issues including the treatment of Uyghur Muslims from a number of Gulf states following talks between their foreign ministers at which they agreed to upgrade relations.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said the ministers and Gulf Cooperation Council Secretary-General Nayef Falah Al-Hajraf expressed firm support for China's "legitimate positions on issues related to Taiwan, Xinjiang and human rights."

A fire erupted in Kuwait during maintenance work at a major oil refinery on Friday, killing two workers and critically injuring five others, the Kuwait National Petroleum Company said.
This is the second fire to erupt at the Mina al-Ahmadi oil refinery in as little as three months. In October, the state-owned oil company reported a fire had erupted at the facility, with some workers suffering from smoke inhalation and others being treated for light burns.

Israeli police has fired tear gas, rubber bullets and stun grenades to disperse hundreds of Bedouin Arabs protesting a tree-planting campaign they say is aimed at pushing them off disputed land.
It was the third consecutive day of demonstrations by Bedouin residents of southern Israel's Negev desert against a forestry project they say is aimed at seizing land near unrecognized villages.
