The Israeli military conducted air strikes and traded fire with Gaza militants on Tuesday in a flare-up of violence following the death in Israeli custody of a Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike.
The army said it hit Gaza with "tank fire" in response to rockets from the Palestinian enclave, sparking a renewed volley from Gaza witnessed by AFP journalists.
Israel has undergone major societal transformations during its 75 years of existence, which have left the nation confronting deepening divisions.
The northern Yiron kibbutz highlights how the country has evolved since its creation on May 14, 1948, as the socialist ideals of some of the founding fathers have given way to greater economic liberalism, and a more multicultural society.
From her modest home in the blockaded Gaza Strip, Amina al-Dabai remembers the very different world in which she grew up more than seven decades ago.
Born in 1934, Dabai was still only a child when Israel was created on May 14, 1948.
Now she is one of 5.9 million Palestinian refugees living in the occupied West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria according to the United Nations.
They are descendants of more than 760,000 Palestinians who fled or were expelled from their homes 75 years ago.
Arab foreign ministers meeting in Amman to discuss Syria's long-running conflict agreed Monday the return of Syrian refugees was a "top priority", according to a communique released after the talks.
The talks in Jordan's capital brought together foreign ministers from Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Egypt, in the latest regional engagement with the long isolated government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Turkey released new details Monday about its successful operation against the Islamic State's global chief, saying he died by setting off a suicide vest to avoid being detained.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Sunday the death of the "suspected leader of Daesh, codename Abu Hussein al-Qurashi".
Turkey's Anadolu state news agency gave his full name as Abu al-Hussein al-Husseini al-Qurashi, saying he joined IS in 2013 and quickly rose through the jihadist group's ranks.
Tunisia's largest union on Monday attacked the government's handling of negotiations with the IMF on a loan to bail out the North African country as it slides deeper into debt.
Tunisia is seeking a bailout package worth nearly $2 billion from the International Monetary Fund, which conditions any aid on a series of reforms.
As Noureddine Taboubi of the Tunisian General Labour Union (UGTT) was giving his May Day speech in the capital Tunis, protesters in the country's second city Sfax denounced "an IMF government", saying "No to colonisation".
Representatives of nearly two dozen countries and international institutions met Monday in Qatar for talks on Afghanistan focusing on women's rights under the Taliban administration, the United Nations said.
The Taliban authorities are absent from the closed-door two-day meeting, and UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said recognition of their rule "is not up for discussion".
The UN on Monday warned more than 800,000 people could flee fighting and dire conditions in Sudan, where explosions again shook the capital in violation of the latest truce extension agreed by warring generals.
The chaos and bloodshed, now in their third week, have already sparked an exodus of tens of thousands of Sudanese to neighbouring countries including Egypt, Chad and Central African Republic.
But the United Nations' refugee agency, UNHCR, said it was bracing for "the possibility that over 800,000 people may flee the fighting in Sudan for neighbouring countries".
Hasan Faraj was brushing his teeth on the morning of April 15 when gunfire erupted outside his building near Khartoum's airport, early shots in a war that caught him totally unprepared.
The Pakistani national had recently handed in his passport to a government office, complicating any effort to leave, and his paltry stash of food and other supplies meant he would struggle to wait out the fighting at home.
The top United Nations humanitarian official is heading to the Sudan region due to the "rapidly deteriorating humanitarian crisis" in the conflict-racked country, the UN chief said.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres' announcement Sunday came shortly after rival Sudanese forces announced the extension of a truce they have largely violated, as warplanes roared overhead and fighting continued in the capital Khartoum.
