The Palestinian Authority has formally asked Israel for talks on changing the Paris Protocol, a key agreement governing economic ties between the two, a minister told Agence France Presse on Sunday.

"I made a request to the Israeli government through the defense ministry... that the Palestinian Authority officially requests the reopening of the Paris Protocol which is not compatible with the current economic situation," said civil affairs minister Hussein al-Sheikh.

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas said on Saturday he will make a bid on September 27 to obtain non-member status at the United Nations.

"We will go to the U.N. General Assembly for consultations with our friends on the draft resolution calling for the upgrade of Palestine (to non-member status)" in the United Nations, Abbas said in a televised address.

Unknown assailants shot dead a senior officer in the Jenin branch of the Palestinian security forces in the northern West Bank city, a Palestinian security official told Agence France Presse Wednesday.

"Unknown assailants opened fire on Hisham Rokh, 41, deputy head of the preventative security forces in Jenin, shortly after midnight as he was returning home in his car," the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

U.S. Democrats dropped a reference to Jerusalem being the capital of Israel from their election platform, prompting scorn from rival Mitt Romney Thursday.

Since 1992 Democrats have stated unequivocally that "Jerusalem is the capital of Israel," as they did in 2008.

Israeli settlers began moving into part of a home in east Jerusalem on Sunday, as police officers enforced a court order requiring the Palestinian family living there to vacate part of it.

The process is the culmination of a years-long battle over the home in the Ras al-Amoud neighborhood, which pitted a Palestinian family against Irving Moskowitz, a millionaire backer of Israeli settlement in the east of the city.

A U.N. official Thursday condemned an Israeli court finding that cleared the army of any blame for the death of U.S. peace activist Rachel Corrie as "a defeat for justice and accountability."

Richard Falk, United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, also called Tuesday's decision in a civil case brought by Corrie's family "a victory for impunity for the Israeli military."

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday welcomed a decision by French prosecutors to open a murder inquiry into claims the late Yasser Arafat may have been poisoned.

The probe was announced on Tuesday, a month after his widow Suha and daughter Zawra launched legal action in France following reports that experts had found traces of the radioactive substance polonium on Arafat's clothes.

Vandals believed to be Jewish extremists on Wednesday torched a car and sprayed anti-Arab graffiti near a refugee camp near Ramallah, an Agence France Presse correspondent and police said.

The incident took place between Jalazoun refugee camp and Dura al-Qara village, both of which lie very close to Beit El settlement.

Progressive Socialist Party MP Walid Jumblat stressed on Monday the importance of allowing the Lebanese state to control the country’s decision of war and peace.

He said in his weekly editorial in the PSP-affiliated al-Anbaa magazine: “We have no doubt over the effectiveness of the resistance’s rockets in displacing hundreds of thousands of Israelis, but the Lebanese people have the right to wonder about their fate and future in case a regional war should erupt.”

Jordan on Sunday barred pro-Palestinian U.S. and European activists from trying to cross into the West Bank for delivering school supplies to students.

"Two buses carrying 100 activists were not allowed to leave the Jordanian side" of Allenby Bridge Crossing, also known as King Hussein Bridge between the West Bank and Jordan, Walid Atallah, a spokesman for the "Welcome to Palestine" campaign in Jordan, told Agence France Presse.