According to the Independent, Hezbollah forces fought alongside Syrian army troops firing mortars and grenade launchers after warplanes and tank fire had bombed Qusair in the morning. Opposition sources reported that at least thirty people were killed during yesterday’s offensive, with Reuters quoting an opposition activist who said “Most of the dead are civilians killed by the shelling.” However, Al Arabiya also reported that senior Hezbollah officer Fady al-Jazzar was among those killed and other accounts say that several Hezbollah fighters died in the fighting.

Qusair, which is located six miles from the Lebanese border is of strategic importance to Assad, as it links the capital Damascus to the Mediterranean coast region, where much of Assad’s Alawite community is based. It is also an important gateway for Syrian opposition forces to smuggle weapons from Lebanon.

Hezbollah’s prominent involvement in the Syrian conflict will be of increasing concern to Israel, which has repeatedly warned about the dangers of sophisticated weapons being transferred to Hezbollah.  Israel is thought to have been responsible for air strikes earlier this month, which targeted a military facility near Damascus, where sophisticated Iranian weaponry was being stored prior to transfer to Hezbollah. At a cabinet meeting yesterday, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that the region “is in one of its most sensitive periods in decades with the escalating upheaval in Syria at its centre.” He said that “The government of Israel is working responsibly… [to] prevent the transfer of advanced weapons to Hezbollah and to [other] terrorist elements.”

The gunmen seized the security personnel in the northern Sinai Peninsula on a road between the towns of el-Arish and Rafah. They then demanded the release of several fellow Islamist extremists currently imprisoned by Egyptian authorities. In response, Egyptian policemen arranged barbed wire across the country’s Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip on Friday. The crossing remains closed, stranding hundreds of Palestinian families with no end to the stand-off in sight. According to Reuters, the protesting policemen announced “We will not open the crossing until the kidnapped soldiers are freed and the interior minister arrives to listen to our demands so that these attacks on us are not repeated.”

The northern section of the Sinai Peninsula has become increasingly lawless since the fall of President Hosni Mubarak in 2011 and since then it has been used as a staging ground for three deadly terror attacks on neighbouring Israel. In March, Egyptian officials said that they apprehended twenty five suspected terrorists in the Sinai region and seized a number of weapons.

Addressing the current border crisis, Egypt’s President Muhammed Morsi yesterday pledged “We will not succumb to any blackmail,” commenting that “all options are open.” A video of the seven kidnapped policemen and soldiers, all blindfolded, was released by their captors. Meanwhile, Egyptian policemen extended their closure of the country’s border, blocking the Nitzana commercial crossing with Israel, twenty five miles south of Rafah, which is responsible predominantly for transporting goods to the Gaza Strip. Hamas official, Sami Abu Zuhri told Al Jazeera that the Egyptian closure was “unjustified and incomprehensible.”

Trajtenberg became a household name in Israel after he headed a government committee to recommend economic changes in the wake of the social protests of summer 2011. Speaking at an event to mark the third anniversary of the UK Task Force, a coalition of thirty-three organisations working to raise awareness of issues relating to Arab citizens of Israel, Trajtenberg detailed the launch of a new Israeli government fund to help Arab students attain a first degree. The fund will match the donations of foundations and philanthropists wishing to contribute. The Pears Foundation, a UK Task Force founding member has agreed to become the fund’s first official partner, pledging $150,000.

Trajtenberg said, “Beyond moral considerations, it is of fundamental importance for the future of Israel to offer the Arab population equal opportunities, upward mobility, good education and promising employment. Through this scholarship fund, amongst other progressive initiatives, we are contributing to a more robust, just and resilient Israeli society… we are delighted to welcome Pears Foundation as our first British partner.”

Co-Chairs of the UK Task Force, Trevor Pears and Michael Wegier commented, “This is a fantastic opportunity for the British Jewish community to partner with the Israeli government and double the impact of their donations to address an issue which is fundamental to Israel’s future prosperity.”

The fund complements the Israel Council for Higher Education’s recently launched Six Year Plan to Enhance Access to Higher Education for Arab Students and is part of wider government efforts to boost the socio-economic welfare of Israel’s Arab citizens.

A  BICOM Podcast with Prof. Trajtenberg on Israel’s economy can be listened to here.

Although the leaderships of the Shas and United Torah Judaism political parties and other mainstream ultra-Orthodox bodies did not formally endorse the demonstration, the gathering outside Jerusalem’s IDF draft office far exceeded the crowd of five thousand for which police had issued a permit to protest. Some sections of the crowd turned violent, in what Jerusalem police chief Yossi Pariente described as “a mass public disturbance.” Stones and other objects were thrown at security personnel with eight policemen injured. Ten protesters were arrested and crowd dispersal methods including water cannon were used.

Speaking at the event, Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach, a leading ultra-Orthodox figure said “There can be no compromise here. We will stand as a wall against these decrees, so nothing can penetrate them… If we create even the smallest gap in this wall, then it will open the way for them to enter.”

Yesterday’s demonstration came as a ministerial committee headed by Science and Technology Minister and Yesh Atid MK Yaakov Peri prepares recommendations for a more equitable draft system. The reform of military enlistment was a major issue in January’s election campaign and a commitment to change the status quo formed part of the coalition agreement which saw Yesh Atid join the government. As a result, Peri’s committee is considering a plan under which just 1,800 ultra-Orthodox religious seminary students would be exempt from service with an estimated 6,200 required to enlist. It was suggested last week that the committee could recommend imprisonment rather than just financial sanctions for those who refuse to enlist. However, with cuts being made to the Defence Ministry budget, some have doubted whether funding will be available for a major upsurge in ultra-Orthodox recruitment.

The United States had advised Erdogan to put his plans to visit Gaza on hold, but after a meeting with US President Obama, the Turkish premier said, “According to my plan, most probably I would be visiting Gaza in June.” He added, “But it will not be a visit only to Gaza. I will also go to the West Bank” where he will presumably meet Palestinian Authority (PA) leaders. Erdogan further commented, “I place a lot of significance on this visit in terms of peace in the Middle East. I’m hoping that that visit will contribute to unity in Palestine.”

Erdogan’s visit to Gaza is likely to test Turkey’s relations with Israel, which have only recently begun to improve after the United States brokered an arrangement to mend a rift which had existed between the two countries since 2010. In March Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu paved the way for reconciliation by apologising to Erdogan after the deaths of nine Turkish citizens who were killed whilst trying to prevent Israeli commandos taking over a Gaza-bound protest ship, the Mavi Marmara in 2010. Two high-level meetings between Israel and Turkish officials have since then taken place, with a compensation deal being finalised, which is intended to pave the way for a full restoration of ties between the two countries.

However, Erdogan’s visit to the Gaza Strip, which is administered by Hamas is likely to anger Israel. It is also liable to antagonise the PA which also does not regard Hamas as the legitimate authority in Gaza, following a bloody Hamas coup which ousted the PA from the area in 2007.

According to Channel Two, Netanyahu told Putin during a three-hour meeting that should the Assad regime utilise the sophisticated system against Israeli aircraft, it “is likely to draw us into a response, and could send the region deteriorating into war.” Russia has agreed to sell Syria an S-300 anti-aircraft missile system, which is capable of intercepting aircraft at a range of over sixty miles and could challenge Israel’s air superiority in the region.

Channel Two also reported last night that Israel has sent an unprecedented message to President Assad that Syrian retaliation to air strikes aimed at preventing weapons transfers would precipitate a heavy Israeli response bringing down his regime. Syrian officials last week threatened to respond to further operations, following an air strike earlier this month, assumed to be carried out by Israel, which targeted military installations near Damascus where sophisticated Iranian weaponry was being stored before being transferred to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Meanwhile, yesterday morning, two mortar shells fired from Syria landed in the Mount Hermon area of the Israeli Golan Heights for the first time. The area is popular with hikers and although the mortars caused no injuries or damage, the site was closed to tourists enjoying a national holiday for several hours. Stray fire from the fighting in Syria has landed in Israeli territory on the Golan Heights on several occasions over the last few months. However, Israeli security officials are investigating whether yesterday’s incident was deliberate, with YNet reporting that a Palestinian group has claimed responsibility for the shelling.

Reports in several Arabic newspapers including the London-based al-Hayat yesterday gave further indication that the Golan Heights could become increasingly volatile, claiming that Iran has convinced Assad to permit Hezbollah to launch attacks against Israel from the area.

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton met yesterday in Istanbul with Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, who is also a candidate in Iran’s presidential election next month. Ashton is responsible for contact between Iran and the so-called P5+1 forum (United States, UK, China, Russia, France and Germany), which leads international efforts to find a diplomatic solution to resolve concerns over Tehran’s nuclear programme. Although Ashton described yesterday’s meeting as “useful”, she was unable to report any substantive development, simply commenting, “we talked about the proposals we had put forward and we will now reflect on how to go on to the next stage of the process.” Iran has so far failed to respond to a P5+1 proposal last month which would have eased international sanctions on Iran in return for ending its’ development of twenty per cent uranium.

Meanwhile, in Vienna, representatives of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) met with Iranian officials but were unable to reach agreement to allow IAEA inspectors access to sites, officials and documents necessary to conduct an investigation into Iran’s nuclear development. The IAEA is especially keen to visit the Parchin plant, where it is suspected nuclear ballistic tests may have been carried out. IAEA Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts told reporters, “we could not finalise the structured approach document that has been under negotiations for a year and-a-half now.” Nackaerts pledged that “our commitment to continue dialogue is unwavering” but added “we must recognize that our best efforts have not been successful so far.”

It is widely thought that further talks on either track are unlikely to take place until after Iran’s presidential election on 14 June.

The Fatah dominated Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, and the Hamas regime in the Gaza Strip have been fierce rivals since a bloody coup by Hamas in Gaza brought an end to a short lived unity government in June 2007. Although relations between the two have warmed over the past several months, efforts to broker reconciliation collapsed in February. Agreement on a unity government has been reached on several occasions over the past few years, but none have been implemented.

Following talks at the Egyptian security services headquarters in Cairo on Tuesday, it was announced that the two sides had agreed to work towards the formation of a new Palestinian government and a date will be set for both presidential and parliamentary elections. A new PA Prime Minister must also be found to replace Salam Fayyad, a popular figure with Western governments, who resigned in April following increasing disagreements with PA President Mahmoud Abbas.

Fatah’s Azzam al-Ahmed told Voice of Palestine radio, “We must take immediate steps to agree on the Palestinian National Council’s electoral law and set a date for elections. We have said these measures must be carried out within three months.” According to AFP, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zohri commented that both sides had decided to “finalize all reconciliation issues in three months, including that of the national unity government.”

Meanwhile, in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, clashes took place yesterday between Israeli security forces and rock-throwing Palestinian demonstrators who were marking Naqba Day (“Catastrophe Day”), a Palestinian commemoration of the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, which happened amidst a war during which many Palestinians fled their homes.

The meeting is expected to take place at Putin’s Black Sea residence at Sochi and a Kremlin statement yesterday confirmed the talks between the two leaders, saying “It is expected that major attention will be paid to the current situation in the Middle East, first and foremost in Syria.” Russia is considered to be a staunch supporter of President Assad’s regime and it is thought that Netanyahu will appeal to Putin to pull out of an agreed sale of the S-300 advanced anti-aircraft missile system to the Assad regime. The sophisticated system is capable of intercepting aircraft at a range of over sixty miles and could challenge Israel’s air superiority in the region. Earlier this month, an air strike, assumed to be carried out by Israel, targeted military installations near Damascus, where sophisticated Iranian weaponry was being stored before being transferred to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The addition of the S-300 system to Assad’s arsenal would also complicate any international efforts to intervene more directly with the bloody Syrian conflict. Both Prime Minister David Cameron and US Secretary of State John Kerry have visited Putin in Russia over the last week, in order to strategise over fostering a peaceful resolution to the Syrian conflict. It is thought that Cameron also raised the subject of the S-300 sale with Putin. Cameron discussed his trip to Russia and efforts to coordinate a Syria strategy with the Russian president during a meeting in Washington yesterday with US President Obama. Cameron said that it is vital to “put pressure on Assad so he knows there is no military victory” although he played down the prospects of any immediate progress.