Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat has noted that the demands of some parties concerning shares in the new cabinet “have become absurd and are apt to protract the vicious state of procrastination the country is going through, amid the growing political, financial, economic and social challenges.”

In his weekly column in his party’s mouthpiece Al-Anbaa newspaper to be published Tuesday, Jumblat described the illegal construction of houses on public property as “an infringement of the State, its image and its role,” stressing that “it cannot be tolerated under any circumstances.”

Security sources in southern Lebanon reported that Israeli soldiers have set up surveillance cameras on the dividing fence between the villages of Ghajar and al-Abbassieh, said the pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat Sunday.

Meanwhile, a number of other troops performed maintenance operations at the dividing fence at the border town of al-Adaisseh.

An explosion rocked a natural gas terminal near Egypt's border with Israel on Wednesday sending flames shooting into the air and forcing the shutdown of the country's export pipeline, said security officials.

It was the second attack in the past month on the al-Sabil terminal near the town of El-Arish just 50 kilometers from the border with Israel. On March 27 gunmen planted explosives at the terminal, that failed to detonate.

The Passover herbs are bitter, but the symbolism is sweet for Poland's Jews, a community which has emerged from the shadow of Nazi German genocide and communist-era anti-Semitism.

As Jews worldwide commemorate the ancient Exodus from Egypt with traditional fare from dry matzoh crackers to herbs in saltwater recalling their forebears' tears, those in Poland say they are grounded confidently in their faith and culture.

Hizbullah doesn’t mind cooperating with Saad Hariri because he views him as “naïve and easily deceived” said Najib Miqati at the end of the July 2006 war, revealed a leaked U.S. Embassy cable published exclusively in al-Rai News on Tuesday.

Miqati, who was then a former prime minister, stated that the absence of a real leader among Lebanon’s Sunnis will empower the “unified and armed Shiite sect,” said the WikiLeaks cable dated August 8, 2006, a few days before the ceasefire in the war was put into effect.

At least one Israeli was killed and four wounded when a Palestinian policeman opened fire on a vehicle near a flashpoint West Bank shrine on Sunday, the Israeli army said.

In a statement, the Israeli military said Palestinian officials confirmed the shooter in the incident was a Palestinian policeman who opened fire "after identifying suspicious movements."

Several warnings received by Israeli security agencies indicate that Hizbullah and Hamas will seek to abduct Israelis vacationing in the Mediterranean area, Haaretz daily reported on Thursday.

The warnings prompted the Counter-Terrorism Bureau to issue a travel alert on April 10, before the week-long Jewish Passover holiday, which began on Monday, the Israeli newspaper said.

Israeli Deputy Premier Moshe Ya’alon stated on Wednesday that the Israeli army “is ready for any possible scenario” on the Jewish state’s border with Lebanon.

He said during a tour of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights: “The developments in Syria are a sign that the people want freedom that the current regime in Damascus cannot provide.”

Israel's police raised the alert level nationwide, while the army division deployed around Gaza said it was "ready for every scenario" as the Jewish state prepared for the feast of Passover.

"Thousands of police have been deployed across the whole country, and particularly in the Jerusalem region," police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told Agence France Presse.

Israeli warplanes launched raids against targets in Gaza overnight after two rockets were fired at Israel from the coastal enclave, Palestinian security officials said on Saturday.

No one was hurt in the air attacks which struck bases of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigade, the military wing of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas which rules Gaza, in Gaza City and east of it, one source said.