Comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the World Economic Forum make it clear he is against the establishment of a Palestinian state, chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat has said.

"Anyone who says they want the settlers to remain is actually saying they don't want the establishment of a Palestinian state," Erakat said in remarks published Monday in Palestinian daily Al-Ayyam.

Egypt's top military council said on Monday its commander Abdel Fattah al-Sisi should heed calls to stand in a presidential election, which he is assured to win after ousting Islamist president Mohammed Morsi, the country's first democratically elected leader.

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces said in a statement "the people's trust in Sisi is a call that must be heeded as the free choice of the people."

Israeli troops shot and seriously wounded a Palestinian man close to the Gaza side of the border on Monday, emergency services in the Hamas-ruled territory said.

Spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra told AFP the 34-year-old was shot east of Deir al-Balah in the center of the strip, without giving his name.

Tunisia's dominant Islamist party expects elections to take place in October, senior Ennahda official Ameur Larayedh told Agence France Presse Monday, the day after parliament approved a new constitution by an overwhelming majority.

"Within six weeks there will be an electoral law. There is a clear path to the next elections, which will probably take place in October 2014," said Larayedh, speaking inside the national assembly.

Hundreds of Iranian journalists have signed a petition urging President Hassan Rouhani to speed up the reopening of their press association, the reformist Etemad newspaper reported on Monday.

The Association of Iranian Journalists was closed down shortly after the swearing in of former hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009.

Hackers attacked Israeli computers including one used by the defense ministry department dealing with civilians in the occupied West Bank, an Israeli data protection expert said on Monday.

"At the beginning of this month a number of mails were sent to a number of companies in Israel, including security organizations," Aviv Raff, chief technology officer at Israeli cyber security firm Seculert told army radio.

Late night attacks in Sunni Arab areas north of Baghdad pushed the overall death toll from violence in Iraq a day earlier to 26, security and medical officials said Monday.

The protracted surge in nationwide unrest, coupled with a deadly standoff in Anbar province between security forces and anti-government fighters, has left more than 850 people dead so far this month.

Five Egyptian diplomats kidnapped in Tripoli following the arrest in Egypt of a former Libyan rebel commander were released Sunday as part of a swap, officials said.

The abduction of the five on Saturday and of another member of the Egyptian embassy's staff a day earlier came after Shaaban Hadeia, a prominent commander in the rebellion that ousted Moammar Gadhafi in 2011, was arrested in Alexandria.

The U.S. military launched a missile strike in Somalia on Sunday targeting a suspected Shebab militant leader, defense officials said.

One of the officials said an unmanned drone launched the missile in the late evening hours, but declined to confirm the suspect's identity or whether the strike was successful.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon welcomed Tunisia's adoption of a new constitution on Sunday, declaring it a "historic milestone" and a model for other countries seeking reform.

Tunisia's transition to democracy "reached another historic milestone with the adoption today of the country's new constitution," Ban said in a statement released by his spokesman Martin Nesirky.