An ex-aide to Benjamin Netanyahu has taken the stand in the former Israeli prime minister's corruption trial, describing his boss as a "control freak" who was obsessed with the way he and his family were portrayed in the media.

Nir Hefetz, a former spokesman for Netanyahu, is a key prosecution witness expected to deliver critical testimony in the trial, which revolves around accusations that Netanyahu committed fraud, breach of trust and accepted bribes. The former premier, now opposition leader, denies any wrongdoing.

Interpol kicked off its annual meeting in Istanbul on Tuesday, to discuss security threats and crime trends as well as to hold a closely-watched election for the international police body' new leadership.

Police chiefs and other representatives from the organization's 194 member countries are attending the three-day General Assembly which is scheduled to vote on Thursday to elect a new presidency and executive committee members.

The head of the United Nations' atomic watchdog met Tuesday with Iranian officials to press for greater access in the Islamic Republic ahead of diplomatic talks restarting over Tehran's tattered nuclear deal with world powers.

Rafael Mariano Grossi of the International Atomic Energy Agency yet again faces tightrope-style talks with Iranian officials as his inspectors remain unable to access surveillance footage and face greater challenges in trying to monitor Tehran's rapidly growing uranium stockpile. In the wake of then-President Donald Trump's unilateral withdrawal from Iran's deal, the Islamic Republic now enriches small amounts of uranium up to 60% purity — its highest ever and close to weapons-grade levels of 90%.

Two Palestinian hunger strikers, including one who went without food for 131 days, have suspended their strikes against Israel's controversial policy of detaining them without charge after reaching a deal that will allow them to go free in the coming months, a prisoner rights group said.

Israel's internal security agency said that it had arrested more than 50 members of a Hamas cell in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem that were involved in planning attacks on Israelis.

The tiny Arab nation of Qatar has for years employed a former CIA officer to help spy on soccer officials as part of a no-expense-spared effort to win and hold on to the 2022 World Cup tournament, an investigation by The Associated Press has found.

It's part of a trend of former U.S. intelligence officers going to work for foreign governments with questionable human rights records that is worrying officials in Washington and prompting calls from some members of Congress for greater scrutiny of an opaque and lucrative market.

After years in Israel's political wilderness, small dovish parties that support Palestinian statehood and oppose Jewish settlements are back in government. But they are finding their influence is limited, with pro-settler coalition partners showing little appetite for compromise and the country's decades-long occupation churning on.

The parties are having to rein themselves in as hopes for a Palestinian state slip further away under their watch, with settlement construction booming and peace talks a distant memory. Nonetheless, the left-leaning lawmakers say their presence in the coalition is important and that the alternative is worse.

A bus crash in western Bulgaria early Tuesday has killed at least 45 people, authorities said.

The bus, registered in North Macedonia, crashed around 2 a.m. and there were children among the victims, authorities said. Seven people were taken to hospitals for treatment.

Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib said Monday Lebanon has received from Russia satellite pictures of the Port of Beirut on the day of last year's devastating blast. The imagery would be the first made available by a foreign government to the Lebanese probe marred by legal challenges and political disputes.

Bou Habib said he hoped the images would help figure out what happened that tragic day. He is visiting Moscow and was speaking after a meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov.

The foreign minister of Yemen's government in exile warned Sunday that a rebel takeover of the crucial, energy-rich city of Marib would be a disaster on the scale of the collapse of its ancient dam that decimated an entire kingdom.

Ahmad Awad Bin Mubarak's comments mark some of the most dire made regarding the offensive by the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, who have held Yemen's capital since September 2014. Though the intervention of Saudi-led coalition halted their march south in 2015, the war has slogged on for years and created the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

A cyberattack on Sunday disrupted access to Iran's privately owned Mahan Air, state TV reported, marking the latest in a series of cyberattacks on Iranian infrastructure that has put the country on edge.