Associates of Kadima leader Tzipi Livni on Friday dismissed as a failure a rally held by her rival Shaul Mofaz in which he called for a prompt leadership race.

The hard core of Palestinian and Israeli demonstrators who have been waging their unusual civil struggle against the route of the separation fence for years, was conspicuously joined by tourists.

An Israeli baby girl was injured when Palestinians threw rocks at the car in which she was riding.

A 59-year-old cult leader from south Tel Aviv who was romantically involved with 17 women and fathered 40 children with them was arrested on Tuesday morning on suspicion of "enslaving" members of his group and raping a number of the women. 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared on Tuesday that Israel would never cede control of united Jerusalem nor retreat to the 1967 borders, according to a bureau statement.

Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon issued a special statement of apology Tuesday night for his treatment of Turkish ambassador to Israel Ahmet Oguz Celikkol on Monday. Ayalon had delivered a rebuke to Celikkol regarding an anti-Israeli television show in Turkey.

Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon faced harsh criticism from inside his Israel Beiteinu party on Tuesday, a day after the evening news broadcasts showed him scolding Turkish Ambassador Oguz Celikkol in a way that Ayalon's critics called humiliating.

At the request of the Palestinian Authority, an Islamic scholar published a fatwa on Tuesday banning Muslims from digging or working in tunnels under the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmad Abu Al-Gheit asserted on Tuesday evening that Egypt insists on the establishment of independent Palestinian state on the territories occupied in 1967 with East Jerusalem as its capital, Egyptian media reported.

Pinchas Wallerstein, secretary general of Yesha, the Council of Jewish Communities of Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip, announced his resignation Monday, to be effective at the end of the month.