Israel shot down a Syrian fighter jet with surface-to-air missiles Tuesday after the plane infiltrated airspace it controls, the military said, in a rare incident that could provoke tensions.

Syrian and Russian aircraft on Tuesday pummelled a jihadist holdout in southern Syria bordering Jordan and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights after deadly strikes overnight, a Britain-based monitor said.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday Turkey was becoming a "dark dictatorship" as he hit back at Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's harsh criticism of a "racist" new Israeli law.

Russia has offered to keep Iranian forces in Syria away from the border with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights but Israel wants Tehran to completely withdraw, an Israeli official said Tuesday.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday branded Israel the "most fascist, racist state" in the world after Israel's parliament passed a new law defining the country as the nation state of the Jewish people.

The Gulf Emirate of Abu Dhabi has ordered the arrest of three "famous" social media users for taking part in a viral dance challenge based on Canadian hip-hop superstar Drake's hit song "In my feelings". 

Any return of Syrian refugees from countries across the region must be conducted on a strictly voluntary basis, the United Nations stressed Monday, after Moscow unveiled plans to cooperate with Washington on the issue.

"That's it? You're sure he's dead?" Seven years had passed with no news, but Salwa could hardly believe her nephew, a Syrian activist arrested in 2011, had been dead the last five.

That's what the civil records employee in Salwa's native Hama, a central government-held city, declared last month after shuffling through papers at her desk.

The UN's top court Monday ordered the United Arab Emirates to protect the rights of Qatari citizens amid a bitter crisis which has snapped ties between Doha and its Gulf neighbours.

Judges at the International Court of Justice in The Hague narrowly ruled that the UAE must "ensure that families, which include a Qatari member, separated by the measures adopted by the UAE ... are reunited", and that Qatari students are allowed "to complete their education" in the Emirates.

The Israeli military says it activated its aerial defense system in response to incoming rockets from the fighting in neighboring Syria.

The military says two interceptors were launched Monday from the David's Sling system after the rockets were identified. No injuries or damage was reported and the military says the rockets landed in Syrian territory.