The Independent, the Guardian, and the Telegraph report that Iran revealed on Sunday that it sentenced an unidentified Iranian-British dual citizen to six years in prison for spying for Britain. No details of the previously undisclosed case were given, including when the person was arrested or where. The judiciary’s Mizan news agency said Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari-Dolatabadi had “referred to a six-year prison sentence for an agent of England’s intelligence service”. It quoted him as saying the same British-Iranian citizen was also under investigation in a separate case related to a private bank, giving no further details.

The Times reports BICOM’s research published today that Iran has a network of 10-13 military bases in Syria. The bases are home to tens of thousands of troops from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which conduct overseas operations, as well as missiles and transfer facilities for supporting Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based Shia militia.

BBC News Online, BBC Radio Four’s Today Programme and the Guardian report that the BBC is making an “unprecedented” appeal to the UN to stop Iran from harassing its Persian service staff in London and their families in Iran. It says Iran has stepped up a campaign of intimidation, including threats, arrests of relatives and travel bans. Iran began targeting the BBC’s Persian service after the disputed 2009 presidential election, when Tehran accused foreign powers of interference. The appeal will be made at a meeting of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

Before news broke last night of a compromise, the Times reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appeared ready to push a dispute with religious parties in his coalition to the brink last night, raising the prospect of a snap election. Right-wing and religious groups in the Israeli government are divided over a bill that would protect the exemption of ultra-Orthodox men from compulsory military service. There have been urgent meetings between the Prime Minister and his political partners. At least three police investigations revolving around bribery allegations also threaten Netanyahu. He has denied any wrongdoing and says he is the victim of a witch hunt. After coalition talks yesterday, Netanyahu’s office said cabinet ministers were waiting for ultra-Orthodox parties, which control 13 of the government’s 66 seats in the 120-member parliament, to present revised legislation. The government needs to pass a law regulating deferral of military service for ultra-Orthodox students because the Supreme Court last year ruled existing legislation unconstitutional.

The Daily Mail via AP reports that an Israeli government official says a last-ditch attempt to approve the reunification of hundreds of families split between Israel and Ethiopia has fallen through. The families are relying on the Cabinet to agree to fund the immigration of 8,000 Ethiopians before parliament votes on the national budget this week. The official says the government discussed the issue at its meeting Sunday but it did not vote on whether to allocate funding.

 The Metro reports that Israel’s Eurovision Song Contest entry has caused a huge stir and is now the hot favourite to win the Eurovision Song Contest in May. The song carries a strong message with lyrics inspired by the #MeToo movement.

The Financial Times reports that Saudi Aramco’s listing is unlikely to go ahead this year, according to British officials who have been warned by their Saudi counterparts that the world’s biggest flotation was expected to be delayed. Several people briefed on the talks said London still had a good chance of securing the listing, which Riyadh said could value the state energy company at $2tn, but any foreign flotation was likely to happen in 2019 at the earliest. Saudi Arabia wants to sell 5 per cent of the world’s largest oil-producing company as part of an economic reform programme driven by Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince, who visited the UK this week.

The Guardian has published an editorial on the topic of last weekend’s visit of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The article highlights the £100m aid deal, promptly branded a “national disgrace,” which will pool expertise to boost infrastructure in poor countries. Critics say that it is meant to whitewash the reputation of Saudi Arabia, which needs such PR thanks to its leading role in the war in Yemen. It also highlights the second announcement: the purchase of Typhoon fighter jets from BAE systems. The editorial concludes by stating that “Britain’s shameful role in Yemen gives it an extra duty to press [the] case [for peace]. But for now it seems more focused on security and promoting Typhoon sales.”

All the Israeli media is dominated by the ongoing coalition crisis, prior to last night’s compromise. Haaretz reports that Netanyahu and United Torah Judaism (UTJ) head Litzman are making progress on a compromise of draft Bill, although it is still dependent on a decision from Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman. Maariv headlines “Efforts Towards a Compromise”, Yediot Ahronot goes with “Election Zigzag”, and Yisrael Hayom’s headline is “Compromise or Blame Battle”.

In the opinion pieces on this issue, Yediot Ahronot’s Nahum Barena writes that “this crisis erupted with the coalition partners jostling with one another to gain some ground… What started out as an attempt to gain a bit more ground devolved into chaos. Netanyahu cooked this stew, Lieberman added the seasoning, Kahlon stirred the pot and Lieberman turned up the flame. Netanyahu, who was supposed to put out the fire early on, allowed it to go out of control. This isn’t the first time that has happened to him”. He also suggests that deep down the ultra-Orthodox parties do not want elections: “Holding early elections isn’t good for the Haredim. It is liable to push Shas beneath the electoral threshold, and without Shas, their ability to negotiate will be vastly diminished… most importantly, there is no guarantee that they will be part of the next coalition government.”

Ben Caspit in Maariv argues that “two battles are being fought simultaneously: Netanyahu’s desperate battle of survival, on the one hand, and an equally desperate battle to succeed Netanyahu, on the other. The second battle is more interesting than the first: it is a battle between two men who want to climb to the top of the pyramid and who know that they can’t do so unless they are part of the only governing party on the right, the Likud. They are Avigdor Lieberman and Naftali Bennett.”

In other news, Maariv reports that the State Attorney Shai Nitzan said that the law enforcement establishment would never recruit a state’s witness and tell them to lie in order to incriminate another person. Speaking at a conference at the Israel Democracy Institute, Nitzan said that “we are committed solely to the truth and to the evidence and any other claim is false”. Last week, Netanyahu had accused the police of telling states witness to lie about their dealings with the Netanyahu family. Kan Radio News reports that Justice Minister Shaked said at the same conference that care must be taken not to have the investigations used as a tool for political assassination and that she hoped that they would not reach the point of an indictment against the Prime Minister.

Yossi Verter in Haaretz suggests that “the Israeli political arena is full of surprises. In May 2012 we went to sleep with a bill to dissolve the Knesset on the table and awoke to find that opposition head Shaul Mofaz had signed an agreement to form a national unity government, ostensibly in an effort to pass a bill to draft the ultra-Orthodox.” However he adds that “this time that won’t happen. The scales are still weighted heavily toward early elections. The man who dissolved a coalition and dragged a country into elections over his patron’s newspaper won’t hesitate to do it again if he thinks it could help save him from criminal prosecution.”

Israel Hayom also reports that who Rabbi who spoke against drafting women into the IDF was removed from reserve duty

Kan Radio News reports that Shaul Elovitch, who own a controlling share of telecom firm Bezeq, was questioned at the offices of Israeli Police unit Lahav 433 for the first time since Nir Hefetz signed a state’s witness agreement. Elovitch was confronted with the details given by Hefetz but continued to stick to his story that there he and Netanyahu had not made any agreement.

Over the weekend, Haaretz and Maariv reported that two Palestinians were killed in separate incidents in the West Bank with one in Hebron and another near Nablus. According to Palestinian reports, the 24-year-old deaf man who was killed in Hebron was shot by IDF troops despite the fact that he was not part of the nearby violent demonstration. An IDF spokesperson said that the man was spotted holding a firebomb in hand.