Israel reiterated Wednesday it would act to prevent any transfer of advanced arms to "militants" during the conflict in Syria, as a newspaper reported an Israeli airstrike along the Syrian-Lebanese border.

Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, speaking at the parliamentary foreign and defense committee, said Israel was closely monitoring the situation in Syria and the regime's moves to dismantle its chemical arms.

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas warned Tuesday Israel would be to blame if ongoing peace talks collapsed over its military control of a border with Jordan.

"We will not accept it, and if they (the talks) collapse, they (Israelis) will be the reason for the collapse, not us," Abbas told the Baltic News Service during a visit to Lithuania, current holder of the European Union's rotating presidency.

Israelis were voting in municipal elections Tuesday expected to be shunned by much of the public, who see local authorities as tainted by corruption.

In 191 municipalities, 8,771 polling stations opened their doors at 7:00 am (0400 GMT) to allow almost 5.5 million voters to cast ballots for both a mayor and a list of local council candidates.

Palestinian and Israeli negotiators have held a new round of peace talks in Jerusalem, a Palestinian official said, saying it had focused on the issue of water resources.

Monday's session was attended by Israeli Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and Palestinian negotiators Mohammed Shtayeh and Saeb Erakat, the official said.

Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian militant from the radical Islamic Jihad movement during a gunbattle near the West Bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday, an army spokesman said.

"A wanted Palestinian terrorist was killed this morning in Bilin during a gunfight with the army while he was in a cave," tweeted army spokesman Avichay Adraee in Arabic.

Two minor earthquakes rattled northern Israel on Tuesday, bringing to six the number of such incidents in less than a week, a spokeswoman for the Israel Geophysical Institute said.

The most recent quake by the town of Meron in northern Israel had a 2.2 magnitude, which is very weak, she said, noting it was unrelated to a 3.3 tremor earlier on Tuesday that had its epicenter on the northern shores of the Sea of Galilee.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Monday that talks between Israel and the Palestinians were intensifying and that all issues were on the table.

He also announced that Qatar had agreed to provide $150 million (110 million euros) in debt relief to the Palestinian Authority.

President Shimon Peres, considered the father of Israel's nuclear program, on Monday sought to justify the policy of ambiguity his country has adopted concerning the issue.

On Iran, Peres said newly elected President Hassan Rouhani represented a "chance", in contrast with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's insistence the moderate leader was a "wolf in sheep's clothing."

Israel's chief peace negotiator Tzipi Livni was on Monday filing an appeal after ministers approved a bill aimed at curbing peace talks on the future of Jerusalem, her spokeswoman said.

The draft law, a copy of which was seen by Agence France Presse, seeks to prevent any negotiations on the future of the Holy City without first obtaining a two-thirds majority of 80 of the 120 members of the Israeli parliament.

European Union rotating president Lithuania called Monday for Israel to stop building settlements in the occupied West Bank, saying they were impeding the peace process.

The statement followed talks between Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite and visiting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas.