Israeli forces have opened fire along the Syrian frontier to disperse a large crowd of pro-Palestinian demonstrators attempting to breach the border.

At least 11 protesters were killed, including a 12-year-old boy, and 220 others were wounded as they marched from the Golan Heights on Sunday, Syrian state TV said.

If anyone had any doubt about whether the Palestinians would declare a state in September, they can't have them now.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu delivered a speech to Congress that essentially was a series of insults to Palestinians and every insult was met by applause and standing ovations.

In fact, Netanyahu's appearance itself was an insult.

In the entire history of the United States, only four foreign leaders have addressed joint sessions of Congress more than once.

At least four people, including children, have been injured in an Israeli tank fire in central Gaza, Israeli and Palestinian sources said.

Witnesses said the Israeli army fired at least three rounds at an area east of the Al-Bureij refugee camp, wounding several Palestinians. Medical workers said four people including a woman and two children had been taken to a hospital with slight injuries.Nineteen Palestinians in Gaza were killed this month.

Tension between Israel and the Palestinians mounted Tuesday after Israeli artillery shelling killed seven people, including three children, and wounded 10 others in response to Gaza militants' homemade rocket attacks on southern Israeli communities.

The Israeli artillery fired six tank shells Tuesday afternoon at a house and a soccer playground in Sheja'eya neighborhood in eastern Gaza City, killing four, including three children and an old man, and wounding 10 others, Palestinian medics and witnesses told Xinhua.

Palestinians are planning a "day of rage" on Friday in response to the US wielding its veto against a UN security council resolution condemning Israeli settlements.

The US decision to use its veto has sparked a furious reaction in the West Bank and Gaza.

Anti-US rallies took place in the West Bank towns of Bethlehem, Tulkarem and Jenin this weekend after the 14-1 vote on the resolution, in which the US stood alone against the rest of the security council, including Britain, Germany and France. It voted in contradiction of its own policy.

The United States vetoed a UN resolution Friday that would have condemned Israeli settlements as "illegal" and called for an immediate halt to all settlement building.

All 14 other Security Council members voted in favour of the resolution.

At least 300 Palestinians were left homeless after Israeli bulldozers, backed by several military vehicles, demolished nearly the entire village of al-Dqayqa, Ma'an news agency reported on Thursday.

Odeh An-Najada, a local councilman for the village, said four bulldozers accompanied by 30 military vehicles entered the area and began destroying homes.

An earlier Israeli army raid on the southern West Bank city of Hebron, where a 65-year-old man was killed and five Islamic Hamas movement activists were detained, on Friday outraged the Islamic movement that rules the Gaza Strip.

Left with nine children, she claims the soldiers lied when they said her husband had threatened them. "We are human beings. The Israeli side must respect us,".

The wealthy Jewish lobby in Britain working under the title of the Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI) has been tipped as the Conservative Party's paymaster.

The CFI as described by British political analysts is beyond doubt the most well- connected and probably the best funded of all Westminster lobbying groups. It works in support of the interests of the Israeli regime.

The CFI's finances may be legal but they are hardly transparent as the lobbying group is an unincorporated association. This is how the British media report about CFI's financial transactions.

The Palestinian leadership will start soon a series of diplomatic activities to gain more international support for promoting the suspended peace process, officials announced on Wednesday.

Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said Wednesday in the West Bank town of Jericho that the Palestinians will apply to the United Nations Security Council to gain international support for halting the Jewish settlement in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.