The Islamic militant group Hamas staged a show of strength to mark its 27th anniversary Sunday, with a military parade through Gaza including a flyover by a drone.

An explosion occurred outside the French cultural center in Gaza City on Friday night, but caused no casualties, an Agence France-Presse photographer said.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he supported Egypt's crackdown on tunnels linking the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip to the Sinai Peninsula and any other action the country took to protect itself from militants, according to a media report Thursday.

"We have supported all the precautionary measures taken by the Egyptian authorities to close the tunnels and stop the trafficking of arms and the passage of people between Gaza and the Sinai," Abbas said in an interview with Egyptian magazine Al-Ahram Al-Arabi due to be published on Saturday, extracts of which were published by MENA news agency.

Israel's navy opened fire on fishing boats off the coast of the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, seriously wounding a Palestinian, fishermen and medics in the blockaded territory said.

The military said it had no knowledge of any injuries, saying the navy had fired in the air as a warning not to exceed a permitted fishing limit.

Amnesty International condemned Thursday Egypt's demolition of hundreds of homes and called for a halt to its "unlawful evictions" of residents to create a buffer zone with the Gaza Strip.

Egypt started work on the zone at the end of October with the aim of stemming jihadists reportedly infiltrating Egypt's Sinai peninsula from across the border.

Israel has thwarted a planned attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Jerusalem's biggest football stadium, arresting 30 suspected militants commanded from Turkey, security services said Thursday.

The Holy City is on edge following a series of deadly "lone-wolf" attacks on Israelis, including deliberate hit-and-run incidents by Palestinian drivers, and the killing of five people in a synagogue.

New EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini called on Israel and the Palestinians Wednesday to resume direct peace talks, as the European Parliament debated whether to recognize a Palestinian state.

MEPs will hold a symbolic vote in December, following resolutions passed by the British and Spanish parliaments, and an official decision to recognize Palestine by the Swedish government.

Twenty-eight trucks of cement entered the battered Gaza Strip Tuesday in only the second delivery of building materials for the private sector since a 50-day summer war, officials said.

Raed Fatuh, the Palestinian Authority official in charge of the entry of goods into Gaza from Israel through the Kerem Shalom crossing, confirmed 28 trucks, each carrying 40 tonnes of cement, had crossed into the enclave.

Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian farmer near the border in northern Gaza on Sunday in the first deadly shooting since an August truce ended a 50-day war, medics said.

Emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra identified the dead man as Fadel Mohammed Halawa, 32, saying the bullet had hit him in the back.

Israel has blocked Norwegian doctor Mads Gilbert from entering the country and thereby accessing the Gaza Strip, but denied Monday it had imposed a lifelong ban on the outspoken medic. 

"He has been banned from entering Israel," foreign ministry spokesman Paul Hirschson told Agence France Presse, categorically denying reports Gilbert had been blocked from entering Gaza.