Israel

A Jerusalem court found former Israeli premier Ehud Olmert guilty of corruption March 30 in a retrial of allegations he received envelopes of cash from a US businessman, the verdict read.
      

The former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was convicted on Monday by the Jerusalem District Court in a retrial, which reversed its earlier 2012 acquittal.

Olmert could face up to five more years in prison as he was found guilty of fraud under "aggravated circumstances" due to the high amount of funds and his high position, the Jerusalem Post reports.

Israel will resume the transfer of tax revenues levied on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, which had been suspended since January.

The re-elected Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu justified this move with rising humanitarian concerns, the deteriorating situation in the Middle East and the rise of extremism.

Israel will release to the Palestinian Authority tax funds it collects on its behalf and withheld as punishment for its move to join the International Criminal Court, the premier's office said March 26.
      

In a damning report released March 26, Amnesty International said Palestinian rocket fire during the 2014 summer war in Gaza had killed more civilians inside the Gaza Strip than inside Israel.
      
Such deadly attacks on civilians were against international law and constituted "a war crime," it said.
      

Israel's outgoing government, at a time of high tensions with Washington, has suspended a controversial plan to build hundreds of new settler homes in annexed east Jerusalem, a news website reported Marhc 25.
      

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin on March 22 began consultations with representatives of parties elected to parliament last week to hear who they would recommend as prime minister.
      

In a fresh rebuke to Benjamin Netanyahu, President Barack Obama said the Israeli leader's pre-election disavowal of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict makes it "hard to find a path" toward serious negotiations to resolve the issue.
   

President Barack Obama told Benjamin Netanyahu on March 19 that Washington would "reassess" its options on U.S.-Israel relations and Middle East diplomacy after the Israeli prime minister took a position against Palestinian statehood during his re-election campaign, a White House official said.
   

A two-state solution to the Middle East conflict will be impossible with an Israeli government headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said on March 19.