Iranian officials on Friday slammed the interception of an Iranian passenger plane by a U.S. fighter jet in the skies over Syria as "illegal," threatening action against Washington over the incident.

Iran had said that one of its airliners, flying from Tehran to Beirut on Thursday, was "harassed" by fighter jets, but later landed safely in Lebanon. A U.S. official confirmed a U.S. jet had passed by the Iranian airliner, but at a "safe" distance.

A German woman kidnapped in Baghdad earlier this week was freed overnight, Iraqi officials said on Friday, without providing additional details.  

"Security forces have freed activist Hella Mewis," Iraq's military spokesman Yahya Rasool said in a statement.

Every chapter of Iraq's modern history can be seen in the sprawling cemetery of Wadi al-Salam outside the holy city of Najaf. Its sandy expanse is growing, this time with coronavirus victims.

A special burial ground near the cemetery has been created specifically for COVID-19 victims because such burials have been rejected by Baghdad cemeteries and elsewhere in Iraq.

Saudi Arabia's 84-year-old ruler King Salman underwent successful surgery Thursday to remove his gall bladder, the royal court said, three days after he was admitted to hospital.

It is rare for Saudi Arabia to report on the health of the aging monarch, who has ruled the top oil exporter and the Arab world's biggest economy since 2015.

A Jordanian couple in Saudi Arabia burst into tears of joy to be among the chosen ones for next week's scaled-down hajj pilgrimage, but countless rejected applications have stirred resentment.

Israel on Thursday freed a senior leader of Hamas in the West Bank after imprisoning him without trial for 16 months, his son said.

The small, neighboring sheikhdoms of Bahrain and Qatar have the world's highest per capita rates of coronavirus infections. In the two Mideast countries, COVID-19 epidemics initially swept undetected through camps housing healthy and young foreign laborers, studies now show.

In Qatar, a new study found that nearly 60% of those testing positive showed no symptoms at all, calling into question the usefulness of mass temperature checks meant to stop the infected from mingling with others. In Bahrain, authorities put the asymptomatic figure even higher, at 68%.

Iraq opened its airports to commercial flights following months of lockdown as part of the government's plan to ease restrictions despite record numbers of coronavirus cases expected to exceed 100,000 this week.

Airports were shut in March along with full-day curfews. Cases have risen exponentially since then and in particular following the Eid holiday in June.

A feared resurgence of the Islamic State has not so far materialized in Iraq, paving the way for a further coalition troop drawdown, a US commander said Wednesday.

Amid mounting calls for Israel's government to appoint a dedicated coronavirus response coordinator, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has named a public health professional to the post, his office said Thursday.

It said in a statement that the job went to Ronnie Gamzu, CEO of Tel Aviv's Sourasky medical complex.