Two Saudi soldiers have been killed in a clash with unidentified gunmen who fired on them from across the border with Yemen, the interior ministry said Thursday.

A border guard patrol in the southwestern province of Asir "came under heavy gunfire on Wednesday morning from unknown sources inside Yemeni territory," said the ministry.

Israeli police said Thursday they arrested five people suspected of demolishing a military base in an extremist settlement in the West Bank, the latest attack against security forces by hardliners.

The suspects, all males aged 16-29, were arrested for involvement in Tuesday's vandalism in the northern West Bank settlement of Yitzhar, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told AFP.

A new Israeli spy satellite entered orbit early Thursday, the defense ministry said, boosting the Jewish state's ability to monitor arch-foe Iran.

The observation remote-sensing Ofek 10 satellite, launched into space on a Shavit rocket late Wednesday, outdoes earlier models with its ability to "skip" from one target to another rather than simply "sweep" areas, ministry officials told reporters.

Israeli soldiers shot and wounded three Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday near the border security fence, the Hamas-run health ministry said.

The three were in moderate condition after the incident, which occurred near Beit Hanoun, Gaza health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra told Agence France Presse.

A Canadian-Egyptian journalist for Al-Jazeera English being tried in Egypt pleaded for his release Thursday, as the prosecution in an unprecedented trial of reporters submitted footage and pictures as evidence.

Three detained journalists with the Qatar-based broadcaster and 17 others people are on trial for alleged links to the blacklisted Muslim Brotherhood movement.

Washington on Wednesday denounced as "unfortunate" an order from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to limit his cabinet's contacts with their Palestinian counterparts.

"We are certainly aware of the announcement. We regard it as unfortunate," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, as her boss John Kerry met with Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.

Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz will travel to Israel and Iran later this month, the ministry announced on Wednesday, as talks on Tehran's disputed nuclear program ended in Vienna.

"A date has not been set but the trip to Iran will probably be in late April," ministry spokesman Martin Weiss told Agence France Presse.

Two car bombs killed at least 25 people, including women and children, in a government-held neighborhood of Syria's central city of Homs Wednesday, state news agency SANA reported.

Another 100 people were wounded in Karam al-Luz, in attacks SANA blamed on "terrorists," the government's term for people fighting to overthrow President Bashar Assad.

Kuwait's royal court appealed for calm Wednesday as the country was abuzz with rumors about a videotape allegedly showing former senior officials plotting to overthrow the oil-rich Gulf state's government.

The appeal comes two days after Sheikh Ahmad Fahad al-Sabah, a senior member of the family and former minister, was questioned by the public prosecutor for five hours about the tape, which he said he had handed over to Kuwait's leaders.

Arab foreign ministers gathered on Wednesday with Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas said Israel was "wholly responsible for the dangerous stalemate" in U.S.-brokered peace talks scheduled to end on April 29.

On Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry also blamed the approval of Israeli settlements in annexed Arab east Jerusalem for derailing peace talks with the Palestinians, but accused both sides of intransigence.