BBC News Online, the Times, the Guardian and the Independent report Saudi women are now officially allowed to get behind the wheel, after a decades-old driving ban was lifted. The change was announced last September and Saudi Arabia issued the first licences to women earlier this month. It was the only country left in the world where women could not drive and families had to hire private chauffeurs for female relatives. However, the move comes amid an intensified crackdown on activists who campaigned for the right to drive. The Guardian also reports that Aseel Al Hamad made a further breakthrough for Saudi Arabian women by driving a Formula One car ahead of the French Grand Prix. The lap of the Le Castellet circuit came on the day the ban ended on women driving on the Gulf kingdom’s roads. Hamad drove a 2012 Renault car as part of a parade of the French manufacturer’s vehicles to mark the return of the race after a 10-year absence.

BBC News Online, the Guardian, the Times, the Telegraph, the Financial Times, the Independent and the Mirror report on the Turkish elections yesterday, with its long-standing leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan having won a new five-year term after securing outright victory in the first round of a presidential poll. Election authority chief Sadi Guven said the president had “received the absolute majority of all valid votes”. State media reports put Erdogan on 53 per cent with 99 per cent of votes counted. His closest rival Muharrem Ince is on 31 per cent. The opposition is yet to officially concede but said it would continue its democratic fight “whatever the result”. It had earlier cast doubt on the results being broadcast by state media. Final results will be announced on Friday. The polls were the most fiercely fought in many years and Erdogan is set to assume sweeping powers under a new executive presidency. According to the Financial Times, the new turbo-charged presidency will grant almost total control over the levers of the state to a divisive leader who was already accused of using ballot box victories to justify a winner-takes-all style of rule. He will now be able to hire and fire ministers and senior civil servants, issue executive decrees that carry the force of law, and wield greater control over judicial appointments.

The Telegraph published a column by Mark Almond, the Director of the Crisis Research Institute at Oxford who argues that “Erdogan may be chastened with his wafer-thin parliamentary majority, but that won’t change how he rules”. He writes that: “…Erdogan argued that Turkey needed a strong presidency to secure the country, in fact the stronger he has become, the more disruption has hit the economy and his country’s relations with its allies in Nato”.

BBC News Online, the Times, the Telegraph, the Metro, the Mirror, the Daily Mail via AP and the Daily Express report on Prince William’s trip to the Middle East and his first stop in Jordan. The Duke of Cambridge will spend the day in Jordan, before becoming the first British royal to make an official visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories. While still in Jordan the prince will visit a refugee programme in the country, and a charity that helps women develop their own livelihoods. Kensington Palace said the “historic nature” of the tour was “important”. He also attended a garden party in honour of the Queen’s official birthday, where he told an audience of Jordanians: “I greatly admire the resilience you in Jordan have shown in the face of the many security and humanitarian challenges that have confronted you as a result of conflicts in this region. “The way in which you opened your doors to hundreds of thousands of refugees from Syria, not to mention your longstanding commitments to Palestinian refugees, is remarkable.” The British prince is expected to visit a Roman settlement where his wife, the Duchess of Cambridge, was photographed with her father in the 1980s.

BBC News Online, the Telegraph and the Daily Mail report that on Sunday, Prince William spent time with Crown Prince Al-Hussein bin Abdullah II in Amman. He watched England’s World Cup match against Panama later with the Crown Prince, making those around him promise not to tell him the score. The Duke and the Prince, later watched the recorded game after dinner, as the Jordanian Royal family hosted their visitor. Kensington Palace tweeted two pictures of the duke and the crown prince casually dressed and sitting side by side on a sofa watching the game on a large screen at the Beit Al Urdun Palace.

The Times published a column by Justin Cohen, editor of the Jewish News which argues that “Prince William’s visit to Israel has been a long time coming”. He writes that: “It’s a moment that will finally fill a long-standing gaping hole in otherwise warm relations between the UK Jewish community and the royals, especially William’s father”.

The Telegraph and the Daily Mail via AFP report that senior adviser to US President Donald Trump Jared Kushner, said Washington would announce its Middle East peace plan soon, and press on with or without Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas. The comments underlined gaping divisions between Washington and the Palestinian leadership that have widened since Trump recognised Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in December and moved the US Embassy to the city, overriding decades of US policy. Palestinian officials, who want East Jerusalem as the capital of a future state, accused Kushner of trying to undermine Abbas and what they described as their leader’s moderate camp.

The Independent reports that an Israeli airline has been accused of discrimination after moving two female passengers when four ultra-Orthodox Jews refused to sit next to the women. The El Al flight from New York to Tel Aviv was delayed for more than an hour while new seats were found for the pair. When flight attendants tried to reason with the men, the group refused to speak to them too – because they were also female. It follows a similar incident last year when a case of discrimination was filed against the airline by a woman who had also been shifted from her designated seat for the same reason.

The Independent reports that the UK would swiftly “recognise Palestine as a state” under a Labour government. Leader Jeremy Corbyn said he would take steps towards “a genuine two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “very early on” if Labour won a general election. Corbyn was speaking in Jordan during his first international trip outside Europe since he was elected Labour leader in 2015. “I think there has to be a recognition of the rights of the Palestinian people to their own state which we as a Labour Party said we would recognise in government as a full state as part of the United Nations,” he said.

The Guardian and the Independent report that the US has warned Syrian rebels in the south-west of the country they should not expect military support to help them resist a major government offensive. The message from Washington comes as Russian jets struck an opposition-held town on Sunday in the first air cover provided by Moscow to an expanding Syrian army offensive in the strategic area bordering Jordan and the Golan Heights. The US message sent to heads of the Free Syrian Army said Washington wanted to make clear that “you should not base your decisions on the assumption or expectation of a military intervention by us”. The Syrian army began ramping up its assault last week in order to recapture the area. Washington had warned the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad and his Russian allies that violations of a “de-escalation” zone agreed by the US and Russia last year would have “serious repercussions” and pledged “firm and appropriate measures”.

Yediot Ahronot splashes on its front page with the message “Welcome Your Royal Highness”, in English as well as Hebrew. Similarly Israel Hayom prominently notes the imminent arrival of the Duke of Cambridge. Both papers outline his visit noting it’s the first official visit by a member of British royal family. He will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, visit Yad Vashem and take part in a football game between Jewish and Arab children. He will visit the Palestinian Authority (PA) and meet with PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. While there, he will visit the grave of Princess Alice, his paternal great-grandmother, who is buried on Mount of Olives. Alice was given the title of Righteous Among the Nations for saving Jews during the Holocaust.

Both Yediot Ahronot and Maariv report revelations about Sara Netanyahu. Last night Channel 2 news released transcripts of conversations between former Netanyahu officials and advisors discussing numerous requests by Sara Netanyahu to have ostensibly private expenses covered by the state, and other seemingly problematic conduct. Among the many issues reported is the allegation that the Prime Minister’s wife took suitcases of family dirty laundry on official visits abroad so that the clothes cold be dry cleaned and pressed in top hotels and paid for on official expenses.

Kan Radio News reports that shots were fired last night from a passing Palestinian vehicle near Migdal Oz in the Etzion Bloc. No one was injured and no damage was caused. The IDF subsequently blocked the entrances to the town of Beit Fajar south of Bethlehem while searching for the car.

Maariv reports new footage released by the IDF showing Gazans releasing flying firebombs from a Hamas lookout near the border.  The IDF spokesperson said: “The arson terrorism is intentional and timed by the Hamas terror organisation.  Hamas is leading the incendiary and explosives kite terrorism, the organisation is the one behind the launching (of the balloons and kites), and it will bear the responsibility for this terror phenomenon.”  Three Palestinians were reported wounded, one of them critically, in an IAF attack on a cell launching incendiary balloons east of Gaza City on Sunday afternoon.  A further 16 fires broke out yesterday on the Israeli side of the border as a result of flying firebombs.

Haaretz reports Jordanian King Abdullah will meet President Trump at the White House later today.  The paper calls it “a last-ditch attempt to influence the contents of the American administration’s Middle East peace plan.”

Yediot Ahronot reports the IDF launched a Patriot anti-aircraft missile in the northern Golan Heights at an incoming drone from Syria on Sunday.  According to the IDF, “The air defence system, just like the detection system, identified the threat in advance, before it had crossed into Israeli territory.  The IDF will not allow a violation of Israel’s sovereignty and will act against any attempt to harm its citizens.”  However, the UAV was able to return unharmed to an area controlled by Syrian President Assad’s forces. Residents in the northern Israeli city of Safed reported seeing a Patriot missile trail in the sky.