Israel's fragile governing coalition faced a crisis on Wednesday after Bedouins staged protests against tree-planting by nationalists on disputed land in the Negev desert.

Some protesters on Tuesday evening hurled stones at vehicles on a highway near Beersheba, blocked the railway line and torched a vehicle. Police said two officers were injured in the violence and local media reported at least 18 people arrested.

Victims of torture in Syria and human rights activists say they hope the upcoming verdict in a landmark trial will be a first step toward justice for countless Syrians who suffered abuse at the hands of President Bashar Assad's government in the country's long-running conflict.

A court in the German city of Koblenz is scheduled to deliver its ruling Thursday in the trial of Anwar Raslan, a former Syrian secret police officer who is accused of crimes against humanity for overseeing the abuse of detainees at a jail near Damascus a decade ago.

Egypt's leader has criticized Europe's handling of the migration crisis and its refusal to receive refugees arriving at its borders, saying his own country has taken in millions of people who left their home countries.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said Egypt hosts at least 6 million people who fled conflict and poverty at home. He said his government, unlike some other countries, doesn't hold migrants in refugee camps but allows them to live freely in the community.

At least two people died and eight were still missing Tuesday after a small truck they were riding in slid off a ferry and plunged into the Nile River, said authorities in Egypt.

The accident happened just outside of Cairo on Monday, in the town of Monshat el-Kanater in Giza province, the office of the public prosecutor said in a statement.

The Palestinian Authority has summoned the Dutch representative to object to the Netherlands' decision to halt funding to a Palestinian civil society group that Israel controversially outlawed as a terrorist organization.

In a statement, the PA decried the "unjust and biased" decision to cut off funding to the Union of Agricultural Work Committees, one of six groups that Israel outlawed in October in what critics said was as an assault on Palestinian civil society.

One of Egypt's last independent human rights organizations has closed down, a statement by the group said, citing government persecution.

Egypt's government has engaged in a widespread crackdown on dissent for years that has stifled many of the country's civil society groups and jailed thousands.

The United Arab Emirates has threatened to jail people who make fun of its anti-Covid measures after mocking photos and videos appeared online.

Forces of Yemen's internationally recognized government have reclaimed the entire southern province of Shabwa from Iran-backed Houthi rebels, officials said Tuesday. The development is a blow to the rebels after government forces earlier this month made significant advances in the country's south.

The government, aided by allies from a pro-government militia, the Giants Brigades, and airstrikes from the Saudi-led coalition, pushed through Shabwa this month, retaking the entire province in a 10-day battle, officials said.

The tremor of a 6.6-magnitude quake that hit off the west coast of Cyprus early Tuesday, was felt in Lebanon.

There were no reports of casualties or structural damage, although the quake was felt around the region with reports from as far away as Turkey, Egypt, Israel and Lebanon, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Libyan security forces raided and violently broke up a protest sit-in by migrants outside a shuttered U.N. community center in the capital of Tripoli, activists and migrants said Monday.

The troops came overnight, smashed up the protest site, arresting hundreds, said activist Tarik Lamloum. Those detained were sent to a detention center in the nearby town of Ain Zara. Others managed to flee from the raid, he said.