Jordan's King Abdullah II on Monday landed in the West Bank city of Ramallah for talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in his first visit in more than a decade.

His helicopter was greeted by a large official delegation as it touched down inside the presidential compound, the Muqataa, an Agence France Presse correspondent said.

Bulldozers flanked by Israeli troops razed four Palestinian homes near the ancient city of Jericho on Tuesday, with Israel saying they endangered a nearby archaeological site.

Ammar Fakhouri, the owner of one of the buildings, told Agence France Presse it was the third time that Israel had demolished properties he owned.

Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani said Sunday that Lebanon should improve its relations with the international community and rejected any deal that would divide the region.

“We should hold onto each other amid attempts to redraw the map of the world particularly in our Arab region,” Qabbani said in his Eid al-Adha sermon.

A member of the militant group Islamic Jihad was killed and three other Palestinians were wounded in Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip on Saturday, Palestinian medics and witnesses said.

Security sources said three raids targeted Khan Yunis in southern Gaza, with the initial two not causing casualties.

France confirmed Friday that it would abstain in a Security Council vote on full Palestinian membership of the United Nations, deputy foreign ministry spokesman Romain Nadal said.

"France reiterates its consistent proposal to envisage for Palestine, at this stage, the status of non-member observer state through a U.N. General Assembly vote that would be another step towards admission," Nadal said.

Irish activists supporting a new bid to break Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip urged their government on Thursday to seek Israeli assurances that a new aid flotilla would be allowed free passage.

The two vessels, the Irish Saoirse (meaning Freedom) and the Canadian Tahrir (Liberation in Arabic) which are carrying 27 people, are south-west of Cyprus and expect to reach Gaza by Friday, the activists told a press conference in Dublin.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday ordered a halt to Israel's financial contributions to UNESCO after the U.N. cultural organization granted the Palestinians full membership.

Netanyahu "ordered that Israel's $2 million-per-annum participation in the budget of UNESCO be frozen, following the organization’s decision to accept the Palestinian Authority into its ranks," the premier's office said.

Two Palestinians were killed and one was wounded on Thursday in an Israeli air strike in the northern Gaza Strip, a spokesman for the Hamas emergency services said.

The Israeli military confirmed the strike in a statement that said the air force had targeted a "terrorist squad" which had opened fire on troops in an area near Gaza's northern border with Israel.

The Palestinian leadership faces decisions about the peace process that will "change the face of the region," presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina said on Thursday.

"The coming weeks and months will be crucial and form an important crossroads, particularly in terms of the peace process in the region," the spokesman for president Mahmud Abbas told Agence France Presse.

Two ships carrying medical aid and activists have set sail from Turkey in a new bid to break Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip, pro-Palestinian activists said on Wednesday.

A statement issued by the Freedom Waves group said the mini-flotilla made up of one Irish ship and one Canadian ship had left Fethiye on Turkey's south coast on Wednesday afternoon and planned to arrive in Gaza on Friday.