JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas Islamists could not be Israel’s peace partner.

But in what could be a departure from long-held positions, the right-wing Israeli leader appeared to hold out the prospect of future territorial compromise if his peace terms — which have drawn Palestinian rejection in the past — are met.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas Islamists could not be Israel’s peace partner.

But in what could be a departure from long-held positions, the right-wing Israeli leader appeared to hold out the prospect of future territorial compromise if his peace terms — which have drawn Palestinian rejection in the past — are met.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu plans to use a visit to Britain and France to portray Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s unity deal with Hamas Islamists as a blow to already dim prospects for peace.

Netanyahu is due to hold talks in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron Wednesday and see French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris Thursday.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu plans to use a visit to Britain and France to portray Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s unity deal with Hamas Islamists as a blow to already dim prospects for peace.

Netanyahu is due to hold talks in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron on Wednesday and see French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris on Thursday.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel, challenged by a surprise Palestinian unity deal, said on Thursday it was born of panic by Hamas and Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas over popular uprisings in Syria and Egypt.

The Jewish state has rejected Wednesday’s announced reconciliation between the Islamist group that runs Gaza and Abbas’s Fatah movement that exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank, a move that seemed certain to complicate any efforts to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – A Palestinian engineer under arrest in Israel was allowed Thursday to speak publicly for the first time since his alleged abduction from Ukraine, saying he knew nothing about an Israeli soldier held by Hamas in Gaza.

Lawyers for Dirar Abu Sisi had accused Israel of trying to concoct charges against the Gaza resident, linking his arrest to efforts to gather intelligence on the enclave’s Hamas rulers and Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, seized by militants in 2006.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel is considering building an artificial island with sea and air ports off blockaded Gaza, as a long-term solution to shipping goods into the Hamas-run Palestinian enclave, the transport minister said.

Yisrael Katz told Army Radio on Wednesday he wants an international force to control the island for “at least 100 years” and for unloaded cargo to be brought into Gaza along a 4.5-km (3-mile)-long bridge with a security checkpoint to prevent arms smuggling.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli naval commandos on Tuesday seized a cargo ship in the Mediterranean carrying what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said were Iranian-supplied weapons intended for Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip.

A military spokeswoman said Israeli forces met no resistance when they intercepted the German-owned “Victoria” some 200 miles from Israel and were taking the vessel to the Israeli port of Ashdod.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli naval commandos on Tuesday seized a freighter in the Mediterranean carrying weapons intended for Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, the military said.

A military spokeswoman said Israeli forces met no resistance when they intercepted the German-owned “Victoria” some 200 miles from Israel and were taking the vessel to Ashdod port in Israel.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel said on Sunday it would build several hundred homes for settlers in the occupied West Bank, a day after a Palestinian attack killed an Israeli couple and three of their children in a settlement.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a special session of a ministerial committee on settlement to approve the step after pledging publicly the stabbings on Saturday would not deter Israel from building more homes for Jews in the West Bank.