The i reports that Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday claimed that Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had delayed possible talks between the two leaders in Moscow, which Abbas said he was prepared to attend next week. The comments come a day after Netanyahu told an envoy of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin that he was prepared to meet Abbas at any point without preconditions.

Writing in the Guardian online, Moustafa Bayoumi says that both US presidential candidates, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have “short-sighted policies” on Israel and the Palestinians and that consequently the problem “will only get worse under the next president”.

The Financial Times reports that that the Israeli company Spacecom, which manufactured the Amos 6 satellite, is likely to receive a £141m refund from Israel Aircraft Industries, plus £30m from insurers. Last week, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket exploded on the test pad at a Florida launch site, destroying the Israeli satellite.

The Daily Mirror and Evening Standard report that former London Mayor Ken Livingstone has defended his comments from earlier this year, in which he suggested that Hitler supported Zionism. Livingstone was subsequently suspended from the Labour Party pending an investigation.

The Times says that hardliners in Iran have criticised two of the country’s banks for “self-sanctioning”, after they halted transactions to the country’s Revolutionary Guards. The article suggests that the banks were attempting “to comply with international banking regulations on terrorism and money laundering”.

The online editions of the Telegraph and the Independent report that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces have carried out a suspected chlorine gas attack in Aleppo, causing dozens of people to be hospitalised due to suffocation.

In the Israeli media, the top story in Maariv, which is also covered prominently in Yediot Ahronot and Haaretz, is a Channel Two poll which indicates that Yesh Atid has overtaken Likud as the most popular party. The poll suggested that for the first time since last year’s election, Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid would win more seats (24 seats) if an election were held today than Prime Minister Netanyahu’s Likud (22 seats). Writing in Yediot Ahronot, Sima Kadmon suggests that the controversy over Netanyahu’s recent handling of the railway maintenance work on the Jewish Sabbath has harmed his poll ratings. She says: “Since Netanyahu was elected prime minister in 2009, he has not faced a crisis like the one now taking place, which managed to upset a large share of the public.”

The top story in both Yediot Ahronot and Israel Hayom is the latest chapter in the railway maintenance work saga. The High Court yesterday ruled that the decision over whether such work should take place over the Jewish Sabbath cannot be taken by the Prime Minister, but is the responsibility of Labour Minister Haim Katz. It remains unclear how the situation will unfold this coming weekend.

A major item in Maariv is Netanyahu’s comments yesterday countering claims by PA President Abbas, who suggested that Netanyahu had delayed a possible meeting between the two in Moscow. During a joint press conference alongside the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, Netanyahu reiterated that he is “willing to meet with Abu Mazen [Abbas] anytime without preconditions for direct talks,” something which he noted he has said “hundreds of times”.