By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON, Feb 12 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump will announce a multi-billion dollar reconstruction plan for Gaza and detail plans for a U.N.-authorized stabilization force for the Palestinian enclave at the first formal meeting of his Board of Peace next week, two senior U.S. officials said on Thursday.

Delegations from at least 20 countries, including many heads of state, are expected to attend the meeting in Washington, D.C., which Trump will chair on February 19, the officials told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

The broadcast by Iranian state-controlled television of interviews with several women not wearing the Muslim headscarf during a rally commemorating the Islamic revolution has angered critics of the clerical system who accused authorities of hypocrisy.

Since shortly after the 1979 revolution, it has been obligatory for women to cover their heads in public, although in recent months there has been growing evidence of women openly flouting the rule, especially in the capital Tehran.

By Phil Stewart, Idrees Ali and Tala Ramadan

WASHINGTON, Feb 12 (Reuters) - The U.S. military said it completed a withdrawal from a strategic base in Syria on Thursday, handing it over to Syrian forces, in the latest sign of strengthening U.S.-Syrian ties that could enable an even larger American drawdown.

The al-Tanf garrison is positioned at the tri-border confluence of Syria, Jordan and Iraq.

JERUSALEM, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday expressed hope that U.S. President Donald Trump may be creating the conditions to reach a deal with Iran.

Netanyahu, in a statement before leaving Washington for Israel, said he had expressed "general scepticism" during his meeting with Trump and that if an agreement is indeed reached, it must include the elements that are very important to Israel.

They include Iran's nuclear programme, its ballistic missiles and Iran’s proxies, he added.

(Reporting by Steven Scheer)

US President Donald Trump threatened Iran Thursday with "very traumatic" consequences if it fails to make a nuclear deal -- but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was skeptical about the quality of any such agreement.

Speaking a day after he hosted Netanyahu at the White House, Trump said he hoped for a result "over the next month" from Washington's negotiations with Tehran over its nuclear program.

"We have to make a deal, otherwise it's going to be very traumatic, very traumatic. I don't want that to happen, but we have to make a deal," Trump told reporters.

By Johan Ahlander and Terje Solsvik

STOCKHOLM, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Norway has been rocked by the release of millions of documents linked to Jeffrey Epstein and indicating that leading politicians and top diplomats had extensive contact with the U.S. sex offender who died by suicide in 2019.

Norway's parliament has appointed a rare external inquiry into the foreign ministry's link to Epstein and there are police investigations of a diplomat couple and a former prime minister, while the World Economic Forum has started an independent investigation of its Norwegian CEO.

DAMASCUS, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Owning a copy of Sayyid Qutb's "Milestones" could land you in jail or worse in Syria when the Assads ruled. But at a Damascus book fair this month, the title by the radical Islamist ideologue was on prominent display and selling well.

Held for the first time since Bashar al-Assad was ousted, this year's Damascus International Book Fair reflects deep changes in Syria since its nominally secular order was overthrown by Islamist rebels led by President Ahmed al-Sharaa.

ISLAMABAD, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will attend the first meeting of U.S. President Donald Trump's "Board of Peace" next week in Washington, the country's foreign office said on Thursday.

Under Trump's Gaza plan, the board was meant to supervise Gaza's temporary governance. Trump thereafter said the board, with him as chair, would be expanded to tackle global conflicts.

The first meeting is scheduled for February 19.

By Miranda Murray

BERLIN, Feb 12 (Reuters) - German director Wim Wenders said on Thursday filmmakers must stay out of politics and focus on changing how people think, at the start of the Berlin Film Festival.

Considered more politically minded than its counterparts in Venice and Cannes, the festival has been repeatedly criticised by pro-Palestinian activists for not taking an overt stance on Gaza, in contrast to the war in Ukraine and the situation in Iran.

HANOI, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Vietnam's top leader, To Lam, plans to travel to the United States next week to attend the inaugural meeting of the Board of Peace, the initiative launched by U.S. President Donald Trump to address global conflicts, according to two people briefed on the matter and a document reviewed by Reuters.