Spotlight
Iraq's caretaker prime minister convened a second round of talks Monday with Iraqi leaders aimed at resolving the ongoing political crisis between rival Shiite blocs, but the representatives of an influential cleric failed once again to attend the gathering.
The seat reserved for Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's party was empty as Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi met with al-Sadr's chief political rivals in the Iran-backed camp, as well as President Barham Salih and U.N. representative Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert.

The Israeli army said Monday there was a "high possibility" that Palestinian-American reporter Shireen Abu Akleh was shot dead by an Israeli soldier who mistook her for a militant.

The German and Israeli presidents are to join relatives of the 11 Israeli athletes killed in the attack by Palestinian militants on the 1972 Munich Olympics to mark the 50th anniversary on Monday, days after an agreement that ended a long dispute over compensation.
Monday's ceremony takes place at the Fuerstenfeldbruck airfield outside Munich, the scene of a botched rescue attempt in which nine of the Israeli athletes, a West German police officer and five of the assailants were killed.

Israeli forces shot and killed a 19-year-old in the occupied West Bank during clashes that broke out early Monday during an Israeli arrest raid, Palestinian officials said.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said the young man, Taher Zakarneh, was shot in the head, the foot and thigh in a town near the West Bank city of Jenin, a bastion of armed struggle against Israeli rule, which has been a focus of the Israeli raids.

Seven Israelis including six soldiers were wounded on Sunday in a shooting attack on an Israeli bus in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli army said.
The army said one of the soldiers was severely wounded while the others and the civilian were lightly hurt.

The Hamas Islamist movement ruling the Gaza Strip announced on Sunday that it executed five Palestinians, including two for "collaboration" with Israel.

Yemeni rebel fighters paraded through Hodeida drawing a stern reminder from the United Nations to abide by a hard-won 2018 agreement to demilitarize the Red Sea port city.

An Israeli attack targeting a Syrian airport tore a hole in the runway and also damaged a nearby piece of tarmac and structure on the military side of the airfield, satellite photos analyzed Friday by The Associated Press showed.
The attack Wednesday night on Aleppo International Airport comes as an Israeli strike only months earlier took out the runway at the country's main airport in the capital, Damascus, over Iranian weapons transfers to the country.

Israel and Germany's presidents will jointly commemorate the 1972 Munich Olympics attack that left 11 Israeli athletes dead, after a last-minute compensation deal averted a feared boycott by bereaved relatives.
Around 70 relatives of victims will join in next Monday's solemn 50th-anniversary ceremony, Ankie Spitzer, whose husband Andre Spitzer counted among the dead, told AFP. Separately, the Israel Olympic Committee confirmed a delegation at the event.

The killing of 11 Israelis at the 1972 Munich Olympics prompted Israel to turn to a strategy which endures to this day: deploying secret operatives abroad to assassinate its enemies.
Ever since the Mossad intelligence service embarked on its Operation "Wrath of God" to hunt down senior militants it blamed for the Munich bloodbath, it has covertly targeted Israel's enemies overseas.
