LONDON — President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron are playing table tennis with London students.
Obama met Cameron at his official 10 Downing St. residence after the president and his wife, Michelle, spent much of Tuesday at Buckingham Palace in the company of Queen Elizabeth II, her husband Prince Philip and other royal family members.
The two leaders shared Obama's limo for the ride to the Globe Academy in London's Southwark neighborhood. The school has more than 900 students, ages 3 to 16.
Obama and Cameron saw some science exhibits, then rolled up their sleeves for a match against two teenage boys. It wasn't known who won. Reporters were escorted from the room with the game in progress.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told a joint session of the US Congress the US and Israel have no better friends than one another.
"Israel has always been pro-American, Israel will always be pro-American," Mr Netanyahu said.
His remarks come four days after he opened a rift with US President Barack Obama over the direction of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
Israel enjoys strong bipartisan support in the US Congress.
"In an unstable Middle East, Israel is the one anchor of stability. In a region of shifting alliances, Israel is America's unwavering ally," Mr Netanyahu said
And he thanked the US and President Barack Obama for killing al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, saying "good riddance".
Mr Netanyahu also gave a vigorous defence of Israel's place in the Middle East, describing it as an outpost of democracy and press freedom in the region.
And he said that of 300 million Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa, only the one million living in Israel "are truly free".
"This startling fact reveals a basic truth," he said. "Israel is not what is wrong about the Middle East, Israel is what is right about the Middle East."
Mr Netanyahu was briefly interrupted by a heckler who denounced Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. He paused used the point to applaud American democracy, saying no one in the "farcical parliaments" of Tehran and Tripoli would be permitted such a protest.
"This is real democracy," he said.
On Friday, Mr Netanyahu rejected Mr Obama's call to base the borders of a future Palestinian state along Israel's pre-1967 lines, with agreed land swaps.
About 500,000 Israelis live in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, areas that lie behind Israel's pre-1967 borders.
In a speech on US policy in the Middle East on Thursday, Mr Obama said the borders of Israel and a future Palestinian state should be based on those pre-1967 borders, referring to those that existed before the Six-Day War.
Since then, Mr Netanyahu, who has said Israel must maintain a military presence in the Jordan valley, has repeatedly rejected Mr Obama's call, referring to the 1967 lines as "indefensible".
Some analysts expect Mr Netanyahu to downplay the significance of the disagreement with the US, Israel's strongest international ally.
Thousands of passengers have had their flights cancelled because of drifting ash from an Icelandic volcano.
Airports affected include Londonderry, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Prestwick, Durham Tees Valley, Newcastle and Carlisle, air traffic services company Nats said.
The UK's emergency response committee, Cobra, met to discuss the knock-on effects of the ash cloud.
Air traffic management body Eurocontrol said about 500 flights were cancelled across Europe on Tuesday.
UK air traffic control service Nats said the ash cloud would continue to affect flights from some airports in Scotland and northern England from 1900 BST on Tuesday until 0100 BST on Wednesday.
Transport Secretary Philip Hammond, who led the Cobra talks, said although there would be widespread disruption for Scottish airports, it was unlikely to last long.
"At the moment the model suggests that disruption later in the week is likely to be limited, but of course the weather patterns are changing all the time," he said.
The Met Office said the ash had reached northern Scotland and would spread across much of the UK by the end of the day.
But forecasters said changing wind patterns made it hard to predict its exact path and concentrations would vary between regions.
The following airlines have announced cancellations:
British Airways will not operate any flights to and from Glasgow, Edinburgh and Newcastle on Tuesday
KLM cancelled flights to and from Aberdeen, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Newcastle as well as from Durham Tees Valley Airport
Aer Lingus cancelled 12 flights to and from Glasgow, Aberdeen and Edinburgh
BMI has cancelled all flights from Edinburgh and Glasgow for the rest of Tuesday
Loganair, based in Glasgow, has cancelled 38 flights. Only inter-island routes in Orkney are unaffected
Eastern Airways will not be operating any services in or out of Scottish airspace
Easyjet has cancelled flights to and from Edinburgh, Glasgow, Inverness, Aberdeen and Newcastle until 1900 BST
Ryanair has cancelled all flights to and from Scotland for the rest of Tuesday
Minor air traffic disruptions were also reported in Norway and a small part of Denmark.
Despite later cancelling its flights, the Irish carrier Ryanair claimed it had made a test flight through ash over Scotland and challenged a ruling some flights should be grounded.
Ryanair said its 90-minute flight at 41,000ft showed there was "no visible volcanic ash cloud or evidence of ash on the airframe, wings or engines".
Ryanair said the "red zone" over Scottish airspace where ash has been classified "high-density" was invented by the Met Office and the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
During last year's disruption, the advice was for planes to avoid the ash at all costs
Since then, the CAA has worked towards a better understanding of what engines can take
There are now three recognised levels of ash concentration
Low: 0 to 0.002 grammes per cubic metre
Medium: 0.002 to 0.004 grammes per cubic metre
High: Over 0.004 grammes per cubic metre
There are no restrictions on flying in low ash concentration
However if an airline wants planes to fly through medium or high concentration ash, it must put forward a "safety case" to its aviation authority showing it has assessed whether the aircraft will be able to cope
The safety case includes information from a series of tests and from consultations between the airlines and plane manufacturers
But a CAA spokesperson said: "The CAA can confirm that at no time did a Ryanair flight enter the notified area of high contamination ash over Scotland this morning."
BBC transport correspondent Richard Scott said the CAA confirmed Ryanair were being, at best, "misleading".
The cancellations come just over a year after another volcanic eruption in Iceland caused widespread disruption across Europe, including the closure of UK airspace, amid concerns about the damage volcanic ash could cause to engine aircraft.
This year, in the UK, the decision on whether to fly or not in ash cloud conditions is down to individual airlines subject to aviation authority approval.
The CAA said procedures were "totally different" to last year and although no airlines had applied to fly in high-density ash, some had applied for, and been given, permission to fly in medium ash.
The Grimsvotn volcano in Vatnajokull National Park began erupting on Saturday and closed Iceland's airspace for a period.
Experts say the eruption is on a different scale to the one last year and ash particles are larger and, as a result, fall to the ground more quickly.
Frances Tuke, from travel industry body Abta, urged passengers to contact their airlines, which he said had legal obligations to their customers.
He said passengers could have a claim under European "denied boarding" regulations.
These state that if a flight is cancelled or delayed for more than five hours, passengers are entitled to be either re-routed, given a replacement flight, or a refund.
Since last year, the CAA has graded ash levels as low, medium or high, and airlines are notified if levels reach medium or high.
All British aircraft can fly in medium-density ash but the airlines need to consider whether to fly, according to risk assessments.
The Foreign Office is advising passengers to remain in regular contact with their travel agent or airline for the latest news on the status of flights and bookings.
Are you planning to fly in or out of the UK or to Iceland? Have your flights been suspended because of the ash cloud? Send us your comments using the form below.
Send your pictures and videos to yourpics@bbc.co.uk or text them to 61124 (UK) or +44 7725 100 100 (International). If you have a large file you canupload here.
US President Barack Obama is visiting Moneygall in the Republic of Ireland as he begins a week-long tour of Europe.
The tiny village in County Offaly was the home of one of his ancestors who emigrated to America in 1850.
Locals greeted Mr Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama with cries of "Welcome home!" as they entered the village.
The Obamas landed in Dublin earlier on Monday. Security is tight for the trip, following the US raid that killed Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan three weeks ago.
Crowds lined the streets in Moneygall, which normally only has 300 residents, to welcome Mr Obama to the village that was home to his great-great-great grandfather, a shoemaker.
During the couple's short visit, they visited the ancestral home of the Kearney family, shook hands with well-wishers lining Moneygall's flag-bedecked main street and enjoyed supping on a pint - or a half, in the first lady's case - of Guinness in one of the village's two pubs.
There had been a minor delay to the US president's schedule when his bomb-proof Cadillac - nicknamed "the Beast" - became stuck on a ramp on the way out of the US embassy in Dublin, forcing the US first couple to switch vehicles.
When he returns to Dublin later, Mr Obama will deliver an open-air speech on College Green.
'Special relationship'
Upon arriving in the capital, President Obama met Irish President Mary McAleese, and also held talks with Taoiseach Enda Kenny.
After the Republic of Ireland, the president will also visit the UK, France and Poland. In France, he will attend a meeting of the Group of Eight (G8) major world powers.
Mark Mardell, the BBC's North America editor, says Afghanistan will be high on the agenda, as will the upheaval in the Arab world.
On Tuesday, Mr Obama flies to London for a three-day state visit to the UK.
He and his wife will stay at Buckingham Palace as guests of the Queen.
Mr Obama will hold talks with Prime Minister David Cameron at 10 Downing Street with the Nato operation in Libya expected to be high on the agenda.
Mr Obama will also address both houses of the UK parliament at Westminster Hall.
It is rare for a foreign head of state to make such an address in Westminster Hall - usually this is reserved for British monarchs.
The White House has said the visit will be an important opportunity for Mr Obama to reaffirm the strength of the "special relationship".
"The US and UK of course enjoy a special relationship," said deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes.
"There is no closer ally for the US in the world than the UK. We are in absolute alignment with the British on a range of core international security interests and, of course, our deeply shared set of values that have tied us together for many decades."
Relations reset
On Thursday Mr Obama heads to Deauville, France, for the G8 summit where he will meet French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan.
On Friday, the US leader travels on to Poland to discuss proposals for a US missile shield in Europe which the Poles will partly host.
President Obama hopes to press the reset button on relations with some US allies, after appearing to take the UK and the rest of Europe for granted, says our North America editor.
Security for the tour is expected to be unprecedented, following the US raid that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan earlier this month.
In an exclusive interview with the BBC aired on Sunday, Mr Obama said he would order a similar operation if another militant leader was found in Pakistan.
The killing of Bin Laden in a Pakistani garrison town strained ties between the two allies.
What are your expectations of President Obama's visit to Ireland? Are you taking part in events in Moneygall? Send us your comments using the form below.
Send your pictures and videos to yourpics@bbc.co.uk or text them to 61124 (UK) or +44 7725 100 100 (International). If you have a large file you canupload here.
The Sudanese town of Abyei has been set on fire, with gunmen looting property, the UN says.
The town and surrounding area are claimed by both Khartoum and by South Sudan, set to become independent in July. The town was captured at the weekend by northern troops.
The UN has urged Sudan's government in Khartoum to withdraw its forces.
South Sudan's secession follows decades of north-south conflict and some fear this dispute could reignite the war.
'Act of war'
In a statement, the UN Mission in Sudan (Unmis) said it "strongly condemns the burning and looting currently being perpetrated by armed elements in Abyei town".
It stressed that the northern troops were "responsible for maintaining law and order in the areas they control", urging Khartoum to "intervene to stop these criminal acts".
South Sudan earlier denounced the Abyei takeover on Saturday as an act of war.
A southern military spokesman told the BBC the north had attacked the area with 5,000 troops, killing civilians and southern soldiers.
Some 20,000 people, almost the whole population of the town, had fled, aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) told the BBC.
Khartoum has said it acted after 22 of its men were killed in a southern ambush earlier this week - a claim denied by South Sudan.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and EU top diplomat Catherine Ashton have both condemned the violence in the region.
Tension over Abyei - claimed by a southern group, the Dinka Ngok, and northern nomads, the Misseriya - has been rising since a referendum on its future scheduled for January was postponed.
Since then there have been fears clashes in the region could spark a new war between the northern-based government of Sudan and the soon-to-be independent South Sudan.
Under a 2005 peace agreement, which ended 22 years of civil war, Abyei was granted special status and a joint north-south administration set up in 2008.
France's highest court has ruled that the stalled corruption trial of former President Jacques Chirac can resume.
Mr Chirac, 78, is accused of embezzling public funds in the 1990s, when he was serving as mayor of Paris.
The trial was adjourned in March after a co-defendant argued that some of the charges were unconstitutional.
However, the Court of Cassation ruled against the challenge on Friday, saying the matter did not need to be referred to the Constitutional Council.
Jacques Chirac, who was mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995, is the first former head of state to stand trial in France since World War II.
'Ghost jobs'
He is accused on two counts of paying members of his Rally for the Republic (RPR) party for municipal jobs that did not exist.
The first count accuses Mr Chirac of embezzlement and breach of trust relating to 21 so-called "ghost jobs".
The second came about from a separate investigation in the Paris suburb of Nanterre and involves an illegal conflict of interest relating to seven ghost jobs.
Mr Chirac denies all the charges.
For years there were persistent rumours of wrong-doing, but Mr Chirac enjoyed immunity from prosecution while he was president from 1995 to 2007.
After 11 years of legal wrangling, he and nine other defendants finally went on trail in March.
On the second day, a lawyer representing Mr Chirac's former chief of staff at city hall, Remy Chardon, challenged the two cases being brought together.
He argued that the statute of limitations had expired in the first case.
The judge decided to refer the question to the Court of Cassation. It ruled on Friday that the constitutional challenge was not valid.
A Paris court will now convene on 20 June to decide when the trial will resume.
The US administration is examining the legality of continuing in the Nato-led Libya campaign beyond Friday.
The War Powers Resolution, passed after US withdrawal from the Vietnam War, rules that involvement in combat operations unauthorised by Congress must be terminated after 60 days.
That deadline is on Friday and deputy secretary of state James Steinberg has said the government is aware of it.
"President Obama has been mindful of the War Powers Resolution," he said.
In reference to the deadline, he said the administration was "actively reviewing" its role.
The president formally informed Congress of US involvement in Libya on 21 March.
White House lawyers are reportedly looking at ways US action in Libya can continue without contravening the resolution.
But Bruce Ackerman, a law professor at Yale University, says continuing without Congressional consent sets a dangerous precedent.
"A future president not as reasonable as President Obama is going to use this case to engage in something much more ambitious.
"From the point of view of long-term constitutional development, this is an important decision which will have precedental force in a very different context."
Congress passed the War Powers Resolution at the end of the Vietnam War, overriding President Nixon's veto.
It built on efforts by the founding fathers to repudiate the model of executive war-making, said Professor Ackerman.
It's bound to be a tense meeting. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with President Obama at the White House Friday, just hours after rejecting the central tenet of Obama's latest peace plan proposal.
In his speech about Middle East issues Thursday, Obama reiterated U.S. support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem, suggesting that Israel revert to the territory it held prior to its gains in the Six-Day War of 1967, while allowing for swaps of land between the two future states.
Just before boarding his plane to Washington, Netanyahu released a statement saying that Obama's proposal would leave his country vulnerable. He implicitly threatened to block Obama's ideas by calling on Israel's many friends in Congress.
Obama has been criticized domestically before after trying to pressure Netanyahu. Although Obama's idea builds on stated U.S. policy, negative reaction was immediate.
"President Obama has thrown Israel under the bus," former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, an all-but-declared presidential candidate, said in a statement.
It's likely to be just the beginning of months of difficult negotiations and angry politics leading up to an expected United Nations vote in September regarding the prospect of Palestinian statehood.
"I think Obama will be cordial and polite, but there will be an absence of warmth here," says Robert Danin, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Caught Off Guard By Events
Obama's plan was an attempt to restart Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, which have been moribund for months. His Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, resigned last week.
Some of the developments that have taken place in the last few weeks have only enhanced Bibi's position, vis a vis the Palestinians. All these support the narrative that Israel is under siege, and how can we make compromises with these people.
- Robert Danin, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations
Netanyahu's visit to Washington comes at what was already a difficult moment for Israel. In the coming days, he will speak to a joint session of Congress. He also addresses the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), an influential pro-Israel advocacy group. Obama will speak to AIPAC as well.
Israel has been caught off guard by the events of the Arab Spring, particularly the downfall of its longtime ally in Egypt, ousted President Hosni Mubarak. Now protests demanding self-determination have come to Israel.
"Israel today, because of events in its own neighborhood and developments at home, has been forced into a very passive posture to maintain the status quo," says Scott Lasensky, a senior research associate at the U.S. Institute of Peace. "What's happening in the Arab world is hard for Israelis to get their hands around."
Further Difficulties At Home
On Sunday, Palestinians staged mass protests in honor of Nakba, or "catastrophe," their term for Israeli independence day. Palestinians demonstrated in the territories and in neighboring countries, breaching the border between Syria and the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. Israeli security forces shot at Palestinians in various locations, killing 16 and injuring scores more.
Fatah, the political party that controls the West Bank, recently reached an accord with Hamas, which governs Gaza, with the two sides working to create a unity government. The U.S., Israel and several other nations classify Hamas, which condemned the killing of Osama bin Laden, as a terrorist organization.
All of this seems to have hardened the Israeli government's position.
"Some of the developments that have taken place in the last few weeks have only enhanced Bibi's position, vis a vis the Palestinians," says Danin, a former State Department official who has been involved in peace process negotiations, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname. "All these support the narrative that Israel is under siege, and how can we make compromises with these people."
The Palestinian Position
After Obama's speech, which appeared to reject the idea of a U.N. vote recognizing Palestine as a state, Palestinian officials vowed to press on with their effort.
I don't think the Arab Spring is going to stop at the borders of Egypt or Syria or Libya. It's going to go beyond that. This is an eventuality that the Israelis have to be prepared for.
- Diana Buttu, former adviser to the Palestinian Authority
"We cannot wait indefinitely while Israel continues to send more settlers to the occupied West Bank and denies Palestinians access to most of our land and holy places, particularly in Jerusalem," Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, wrote in The New York Times on Sunday. "Neither political pressure nor promises of rewards by the United States have stopped Israel's settlement program."
As Obama spoke Thursday, Israelis approved construction of 1,500 new homes in disputed quarters of Jerusalem.
Danin suggests that Palestinians will proceed with the political plans, both in terms of setting up a unity government that includes Hamas and pushing for a statehood vote, because there are no "opportunity costs" involved in doing so. By which he means, they don't expect to get anywhere with the Netanyahu government at the negotiating table at this point.
"It's clear to us that he is not interested in negotiating," says Diana Buttu, a former legal and communications adviser to the Palestinian Authority, who is now a fellow at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.
More Protests To Come
Buttu suggests that if Israel is unwilling to make any serious concessions, Palestinians will continue to press their grievances, appealing to the court of world opinion.
"I don't think the Arab Spring is going to stop at the borders of Egypt or Syria or Libya," she says. "It's going to go beyond that. This is an eventuality that the Israelis have to be prepared for."
Palestinians have shown themselves in the past to be fully capable of launching a sustained set of protests. The prospect of a third intifada has led some U.S. and Israeli officials to argue that Israel will have to get serious about negotiations or offer the Palestinian something of substance — or risk increasing international isolation.
Any Way Out?
The new approach is balanced. Palestinians have to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Israel has to accept the 1967 lines as the baseline for the future borders.
- Yoram Peri, director of the Institute for Israel Studies at the University of Maryland
Obama's plan has some potential to break the logjam, suggests Yoram Peri, a former political adviser to the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Peri is now the director of the Institute for Israel Studies at the University of Maryland.
Obama's approach is "interesting and new," Peri says, because it would divide negotiations into two stages. First, questions surrounding borders and recognition and secondly, the even more intractable problems of the status of Jerusalem and the right of Palestinian refugees to return.
"The new approach is balanced," Peri says. "Palestinians have to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Israel has to accept the 1967 lines as the baseline for the future borders."
Peri believes Obama would bring the same balanced approach to the second, more difficult stage of negotiations. But that doesn't mean he'd be likely to meet with success.
"My assessment: Neither party will accept the new proposal," he says. "The march to the U.N. in September continues."
US President Barack Obama is to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington shortly amid sharp differences on the way forward for the Middle East peace process.
Mr Obama has said a future Palestinian state must be based on the borders that existed prior to the 1967 war.
He said "mutually agreed swaps" would help create "a viable Palestine, and a secure Israel".
But Mr Netanyahu said the pre-1967 borders were "indefensible".
An estimated 500,000 Israelis live in settlements built in the West Bank, which lies outside those borders.
The settlements are illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.
In a keynote speech on Thursday on the future of US policy in the Middle East, President Obama said: "The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine.
In many ways the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, should be a man content with his lot. He is on a high-profile visit to Washington where he will be met with a firm handshake and warm words from President Barack Obama.
In a historic address to a joint-session of Congress next week, he can expect to be repeatedly applauded as he describes how his government tirelessly searches for peace.
And at the annual conference of Aipac - the American pro-Israel lobby - he will be feted as a hero and beacon of light in an otherwise hostile region.
But at home, in a dramatically changing Middle East, the Israeli leader appears increasingly out-manoeuvred and out of step with the attempts of others to resolve the frustrating and long-standing stalemate in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognised borders are established for both states."
In a statement, Mr Netanyahu's office said he appreciated Mr Obama's "commitment to peace" but that for peace to endure, "the viability of a Palestinian state cannot come at the expense of the viability of the one and only Jewish state".
The statement called on Mr Obama to reaffirm commitments made to Israel by the US in 2004.
"Among other things, those commitments relate to Israel not having to withdraw to the 1967 lines which are both indefensible and which would leave major Israeli population centres in Judea and Samaria beyond those lines," it said.
"Those commitments also ensure Israel's well-being as a Jewish state by making clear that Palestinian refugees will settle in a future Palestinian state rather than in Israel."
One Israeli official travelling to Washington on the plane with Mr Netanyahu said: "There is a feeling that Washington does not understand the reality, doesn't understand what we face."
'Arab Spring'
The BBC's Wyre Davies in Jerusalem says that while Mr Netanyahu will be warmly welcomed in the US, he is coming under increasing international pressure to ease his objections to a Palestinian state following the unity deal signed between rival Palestinian groups Hamas and Fatah earlier this month.
If the unity project holds, says our correspondent, Mr Netanyahu could find himself foundering while other countries embrace fresh Palestinian initiatives.
Israel's claim to being the only democratic state in the region has also been undermined by the dramatic developments of the "Arab Spring" anti-government uprisings, our correspondent adds.
The push for democracy began with the overthrowing of Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in January. Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak was later toppled in Egypt, with demonstrators in Libya currently working to overthrow Muammar Gaddafi.
Similar uprisings are also taking hold in Bahrain, Yemen and Syria.
The Palestinian leadership is split between the Palestinian Authority, which is dominated by the Fatah political faction and governs the West Bank, and the Islamist movement Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is due to meet colleagues to decide on the next move, with senior officials saying they have been ordered not to speak to reporters beforehand.
A senior member of Hamas, Foreign Minister Mohamed Awad, told the BBC that tangible steps were needed from the US president, not mere slogans.
"Obama didn't say anything about the suffering of the Palestinian people, who are suffering for more than 63 years," he said.
"He didn't say that the peace process had already reached a dead end... He tried to please everyone but he didn't try to please the Palestinian people."
Misrata siege lifted
Are you planning to fly in or out of the UK or to Iceland? Have your flights been suspended because of the ash cloud? Send us your comments using the form below.