Spotlight
Israeli lawmakers have passed two laws that could threaten the work of the main U.N. agency providing aid to people in Gaza by barring it from operating on Israeli soil, severing ties with it.
The laws, which do not immediately take effect, signal a new low for a long-troubled relationship between Israel and the U.N. Israel's international allies said they were deeply worried about their potential impact on Palestinians as the Gaza war's humanitarian toll worsens.

Israel is discussing an Egyptian cease-fire proposal that would see four hostages released in exchange for a two-day halt to the fighting in Gaza, an Israel official said Monday.

Israel’s parliament is scheduled to vote Monday on a pair of bills that would effectively sever ties with the U.N. agency responsible for distributing aid in Gaza, strip it of legal immunities and restrict its ability to support Palestinians in east Jerusalem and the West Bank.
Israel accuses the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, or UNRWA, of turning a blind eye to Hamas militants it says have infiltrated its staff, including a small number of its 13,000 employees in Gaza who participated in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel. The agency denies it knowingly aids armed groups and says it acts quickly to purge any suspected militants from its ranks.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Iran seeks to develop a "stockpile" of nuclear bombs aimed at destroying Israel, two days after Israel bombed military targets in the Islamic republic.
"Iran is striving to develop a stockpile of nuclear bombs to destroy us, equipped with long-range missiles, intercontinental missiles that Iran is trying to develop," Netanyahu said in a speech to lawmakers as Israel's parliament began its winter session. "Iran could threaten the entire world at any point."

Palestinian prisoner rights organizations accused Israeli prison authorities on Monday of "brutally assaulting" Marwan Barghouti, the most prominent Palestinian detainee in Israeli custody.
Prison system staff assaulted Barghouti in his solitary confinement cell at Megiddo Prison in northern Israel on September 9, the Palestinian Commission of Detainees' Affairs, the Palestinian Prisoners' Club and a support group for Barghouti said in statements.

Iranian media on Monday said a civilian was killed during the Israeli strikes over the weekend which targeted military sites, although authorities had not previously reported civilian deaths.
"The martyr Allahverdi Rahimpour, a civilian who was killed near Tehran during the recent attack by the Zionist regime, has been buried," the local Fars news agency reported. Tasnim news agency also reported the death.

The top commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards has warned Israel it would face "bitter consequences" after its attack on Iranian military sites, local media said on Monday.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian says his country will respond to Israel “appropriately," after Israel openly attacked Iranian military sites for the first time this weekend.
“We are not seeking war, but we will defend the rights of our nation and country and will respond appropriately to the Zionist regime’s aggression,” Pezeshkian was quoted by state TV on Sunday as saying.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that the strikes “severely harmed” Iran and achieved all of Israel’s goals.

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sunday said Israel's attack on the Islamic republic "should neither be exaggerated nor minimized."
