The Financial Times online includes a feature on the search for a new Governor of the Bank of Israel to succeed Stanley Fischer, who retired in June. Two nominees, selected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Yair Lapid have withdrawn their candidacies over the past week, leaving the identity in the incoming Governor unclear and a public debate over the selection process.

The Guardian online says that Egypt’s military rulers have offered the Muslim Brotherhood three ministerial positions in a unity government if protests in support of ousted premier Mohammed Morsi are brought to an end. Muslim Brotherhood officials deny that any such offer has been made.

Meanwhile, the Telegraph online reports that opposition forces in Syria have captured a strategically important military airport situated between the city of Aleppo and the Turkish border. Syrian rebels have recently suffered a series of defeats in the area at the hands of President Assad’s forces, backed by Hezbollah. The Financial Times online says that Syrian opposition forces have pushed into Alawite strongholds, the heartland of Assad’s support, near the port city of Latakia. The Independent covers a report by Human Rights Watch which says that Assad’s indiscriminate rocket fire in civilian areas amounts to war crimes.

According to the Telegraph, a series of secretive meetings have taken place, most recently in Beirut, between Iranian officials and representatives of Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip. It is believed that Iran scaled back its material support for Hamas after the organisation shut its headquarters in Damascus in opposition to Syrian President Assad, a close ally of Tehran. The recent talks are apparently aimed at repairing the Hamas-Iran rift, especially in light of the fall of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, considered a close ideological ally for Hamas. Meanwhile, both the Times and the online edition of the Telegraph report that Iran’s former-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has been appointed to the influential Expediency Council, in a sign of a possible rapprochement between Ahmadinejad and Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.

The Guardian online says that the United States’ embassies and consulates in the Middle East, which have been closed over a security threat, could remain shut for several weeks. The Telegraph online speculates that the alert was triggered by intercepted rare communication between al-Qaeda head Ayman al-Zawahiri and the head of the organisation in Yemen.

In the Israeli media this morning, focus remains on the widespread polio vaccinations being distributed to children in the south of the country following the discovery of a strain of the virus two months ago. A reported four thousand children were vaccinated yesterday, making it the headline story in Yediot Ahronot and Israel Hayom, while Makor Rishon suggests that the programme could be extended to other parts of the country.

Maariv and Makor Rishon report comments made by the Director of the IDF Planning and Manpower Division to a Knesset committee considering legislation to draft large numbers of ultra-Orthodox students. The IDF officer accused religious seminaries of lying about the numbers of students who learn full-time at their institutions in order to secure unjustified exemptions.

Meanwhile, Israel Hayom publishes data which indicates that the population growth of West Bank settlements outstrips the national average. Settler leaders are quoted saying that the statistics are evidence of the need for renewed construction, which has slowed down lately. Meanwhile, opponents of the settlements are quoted saying that the numbers demonstrate that settlements pose a threat to a two-state solution.