The Financial Times and the Daily Telegraph analyse statements made by Israel’s outgoing home front defence minister, Matan Vilnai, who warns that an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear programme is likely to trigger a war that could last 30 days. The Times reports that four men have been arrested in Germany in raids aimed at thwarting illegal exports of nuclear technology to Iran. The Times, Guardian and the Independent report that the families of murdered Iranian nuclear scientists have filed a lawsuit against Israel, the US and the UK, accusing them of involvement in the assassination. The Independent reports that UN investigators have found that troops and militiamen affiliated with the Assad regime have committed war crimes and were responsible for a massacre in the village of Houla in May. The Independent also notes that Israeli settlers have dismissed reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was planning to bury a controversial report urging the legalisation of unauthorised outposts in the West Bank seized from Jordan in 1967 that even Israel considers illegal. The Daily Telegraph publishes a comment piece on the importance of covert efforts by security services to curb terrorism.

In the Israeli press, all papers cover the security forces efforts to locate the landing sites of two rockets that were fired from the Egyptian-controlled Sinai Peninsula toward the Israeli resort city of Eilat. Maariv reports that an unknown organization, identifying itself as the Salafi Front, has taken responsibility for the attack. The Times of Israel, Ynet and Maariv note an interview given by Israel’s Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren, in which he notes that an Israeli strike that would only delay the Iranian nuclear programme is better than total inaction. In an analysis of statements made by the UN’s top ranking defence officials earlier this week, Attila Shumpalvi in Ynet suggests that the US has delivered the strongest message yet of its opposition to an Israeli strike in Iran. The Jerusalem Post reports that as a gesture to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Israel’s Defence Ministry wants to grant Palestinians an additional 6,000 permits for construction work in Israel. The paper also notes that the Organisation for Islamic Cooperation has voted to suspend Syria’s membership following the regimes violence against its citizens. Israel Hayom, the Jerusalem Post and Ynet also report on a statement made by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Wednesday that he was confident “the fake Zionist (regime) will disappear from the landscape of geography,” Iran’s Mehr News Agency reported. The Jerusalem Post and Times of Israel report that the Tel Aviv Municipality on Wednesday approved a list of 60 underground parking lots that can be used as bomb shelters in the case of a missile attack on the home front.