Palestine region)

Türkiye's reconciliation efforts with Israel will in no way diminish Ankara's support for the cause of the Palestinians, the Turkish leader said on Aug. 23. 

Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian woman in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday who they said had approached them while carrying a knife. Another Palestinian was killed as the army went to demolish the family home of an attacker.

Turkey will continue to lend a support to Palestine's legitimate struggle, Turkey's top diplomat has said, as a senior Turkish delegation was scheduled to hold talks with their Israeli counterparts for the normalization of ties between the two states.

A Palestinian doctor is practicing medicine in Turkey after completing his studies on a scholarship.

Mohammed Abusharekh, 33, fled Israeli aggression while studying medicine at Jerusalem University in 2007.

Abusharekh was forced to drop out of university as it was on the Israeli side.

Turkey's Consul General in Jerusalem welcomed a decision late on Jan. 15 to hold national elections in Palestine. 

"Turkey had long been waiting for a reconciliation between Palestinian parties through elections," Ahmet Rıza Demirer told Anadolu Agency.

Mohammed Dahlan, the powerful arch-rival to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, was sentenced in absentia to three years of prison by a court in Ramallah on Wednesday.

Bulgarian authorities are investigating the death of a Palestinian citizen, Omar Nayef Zayed, who was found in a critical condition in the grounds of the Palestinian embassy in Sofia on Friday.

He died at the scene before the paramedics could take him to hospital, the Secretary-General of the Interior Ministry, Georgi Kostov, said. This was later confirmed by the embassy.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas resigned on Aug. 22 as head of the Palestine Liberation Organisation's Executive Committee in a bid to force new elections for the top body, an official said.

Palestine's weak economy remains crippled by high unemployment amid embargoes and intermittent war, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a report on June 18.

An IMF mission led by Christoph Duenwald visited East Jerusalem and Ramallah from June 10 to 18 to assess recent economic developments in the West Bank and Gaza and the financial situation of the Palestinian Authority.

Seven Israeli soldiers were to face a disciplinary hearing on June 14 after video emerged of troops beating an unarmed Palestinian in a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.