RAMALLAH, February 13, 2017 (WAFA) – The approval of an amendment to the “Muezzin bill”, which seeks to the Muslim call to prayer in Israel and occupied East Jerusalem hit the front page headlines in Palestinian dailies.

Al-Quds and al-Ayyam said Israel’s Ministerial Committee for Legislation approved an amendment to the bill which seeks to muffle the Muslim call to prayer.

The three dailies said the Palestinian government slammed the approval of the bill as serious violation of freedom to worship and Jerusalem.

Al-Quds and al-Ayyam said that Israeli forces delivered stop-construction orders for 16 Palestinian-owned structures in the northern Jordan Valley village of Khirbet al-Fuqa, a rural community in the West Bank.

Al-Quds and al-Ayyam also highlighted the United States’ objection for a United Nations’ (UN) proposal to appoint former Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to head the UN mission to Libya.

It reported in this regard on the UN denying reports that it offered former Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni a senior position ]in a move designed to obtain US approval for the appointment of Fayyad[.

Al-Ayyam reported on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as hailing the US veto of the appointment of Fayyad to the UN position.

The two papers said Netanyahu pledged to promote “responsible policies” at his meeting with US President Donald Trump.

Al-Quds read that Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said the so-called Regularization Bill “will cause Israel to be seen as an apartheid state.”

The bill would retroactively legalize under Israeli law dozens of so-called settlement outposts built on privately-owned Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank.

These outposts were built without official approval from Israeli authorities, but tacitly supported by successive Israeli governments, part of an effort to colonize as much Palestinian land in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, as possible. Under international law, all Israeli settlements, including outposts, are illegal.

Moreover, al-Quds said top NFL football player Michael Bennett pulled out of a trip to Israel.

Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida reported on President Mahmoud Abbas who congratulated Frank-Walter Steinmeier on being elected as German president.

Al-Hayat al-Jadida said the Church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fish in Tabgha, northern Israel was reopened 20 months after an arson attack by Jewish “terrorists”.

K.F/M.H