Israel, Wars | featured news

Panetta won't dispute a report that he believes Israel may attack Iran this spring in an attempt to set back Iran's nuclear program.

Israeli fighter jets attacked what the country said were "terrorist sites" in Gaza in retribution for an earlier attack, the military said Sunday.

A UN human rights investigator, Richard Falk, is to question the legality of Israel's Gaza incursion in a new report.

LONDON (Reuters) - Israel is involved in a covert war of sabotage inside Iran in an effort to delay Tehran's attempts to develop a nuclear weapon, the Daily Telegraph newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Hamas officials said Friday that an announcement of an 18-month cease-fire with Israel was days away. An Israeli official said nothing had been agreed yet.

Israel launched air strikes against a number of targets in Gaza Monday to retaliate against Palestinian militants who have fired a "barrage" of rockets inside the Jewish state in recent days, the military said.

As Israel prepared to launch its assault into Gaza in late December, it braced for substantial casualties among its own troops. Commanders warned their men of Hamas' suicide commandos, missiles that could smash tanks and knock helicopters out of the sky, and long-range rockets that could reach deeper into Israel.

Gaza militants launched two rockets into southern Israel Sunday, drawing a threat of “harsh and disproportionate” retaliation from Israel’s prime minister.

The Israeli military said that Palestinians detonated an explosive device near troops patrolling on the Israeli side of the Gaza border in the first incident since the cease-fire.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says Israel will protect from prosecution any of its soldiers accused of war crimes in Gaza.