The confrontation at a housing facility adjacent to Israel’s Embassy in Amman, Jordan, last week, which left an embassy security guard wounded and two Jordanian citizens dead has placed both governments in a very difficult position. Israeli officials have indicated that they would like to move on and restore full diplomatic, commercial and security-related cooperation as soon as possible, but Jordan’s King Abdullah said on Sunday that there was a moral principle involved and his people are demanding “justice” be done, making it impossible to simply go back to the status quo ante.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei gave a fiery speech over the weekend, urging Moslems to exploit the opportunity of the upcoming Hajj in Mecca to pray and act against what he declared were “Israeli efforts to control the Aksa Mosque.” Elsewhere, Iranian officials lashed out at the US over recent legislation passed by Congress to increase sanctions on the Islamic Republic over its renegade ballistic missile program.

The ancient port city of Jaffa, just south of Tel Aviv, was briefly the scene of violent street riots over the weekend before returning to its customary quiet on Sunday afternoon. The disturbances began when several suspects fired weapons in a neighborhood close to the port facilities, prompting a police response which led to another shootout, in which a young Arab man was killed and another wounded. Dozens of young Arab men soon gathered at the location where the shootout occurred and began lighting dumpsters and throwing stones at police.

Elor Azaria, the IDF soldier who was convicted in a court martial for shooting to death a terrorist, who was “already neutralized” in Hebron in 2016, had his conviction upheld by an IDF Military Court of Appeals on Sunday. However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as several other prominent political leaders have called for him to be pardoned, while IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gadi Eisenkot has also hinted that this is what he thinks should be done.

Dramatic developments surfaced over the weekend in the investigation into allegations of corruption surrounding Israel’s purchase of submarines from the German industrial conglomerate ThyssenKrupp. Miki Ganor, who was ThyssenKrupp’s representative in Israel, recently signed a deal with prosecutors to testify against other individuals suspected of wrongdoing in exchange for leniency in his own case. On Sunday he told prosecutors that he had retained the legal services of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal lawyer, David Shimron, and agreed to pay him $9 million for, allegedly, assisting him in securing a government contract. Shimron’s lawyers denied the allegations.

The agreement reached between U.S. President Trump and Russian President Putin on July 7, 2017, about establishing a de-escalation zone in southwestern Syria was accepted with mixed feelings in Israel. Israel has five major concerns regarding the Iranian entrenchment in Syria.

Read in-depth analysis by some of Israel’s top experts on the war in Syria and its implications for Israel, Russia’s re-emergence in the Middle East, Iran’s growing power in the region and more. (PDF)