A Russian-negotiated cease-fire took effect Wednesday in a volatile southern city, according to the Syrian opposition and state media.

Violence in the area in recent weeks between government forces and opposition fighters had threatened to undo years of relative calm along the borders with Israel and Jordan.

Palestinian health authorities are launching a vaccination drive for students in the Gaza Strip ages 16-18 as the territory contends with a third wave of coronavirus infections.

Health officials began giving the Pfizer vaccine in Gaza Strip schools on Wednesday and aim to inoculate more than 100,000 students in the coming weeks. Palestinian officials in the occupied West Bank began a similar drive on Tuesday.

A drone attack on Saudi Arabia's Abha airport wounded eight people on Tuesday, said the Saudi-led coalition battling Huthi rebels in neighboring Yemen.

Following an earlier reported attack, "a second drone attempting to attack Abha International Airport was intercepted and shot down", the coalition said in a statement carried by the kingdom's official Al-Ekhbariya television channel.

Tunisia issued an arrest warrant Tuesday for former presidential candidate Nabil Karoui and his brother, authorities said, a day after reports that they were detained in neighboring Algeria.

Karoui was runner-up in Tunisia's 2019 presidential election, a poll won by Kais Saied, who in July this year suspended parliament and granted himself sweeping presidential powers.

Tunisian farmers are turning to the past to ensure a future by planting indigenous seeds as the North African country suffers at a time of drought, disease and climate change.

Traditional seeds come from a genetic heritage best suited to the environment, said Maher Medini, from Tunisia's National Gene Bank, which promotes the development of sustainable agriculture in the country.

Countries neighboring Libya wrapped up their meeting Tuesday in Algeria, with calls for foreign fighters and mercenaries to be pulled out from the conflict-stricken North African nation.

The two-day meeting also urged Libyan parties to stick to a political road map that ended hostilities last year and set parliamentary and presidential elections in December.

Israel's top diplomat in Dubai has said he is hopeful a deal to ship Emirati oil will clear environmental hurdles as trade booms after the groundbreaking opening of ties.

Ilan Sztulman Starosta, who heads Israel's first consulate in the UAE economic hub, told AFP that trade between the two countries would "easily" surpass $1 billion within a year if the Covid pandemic abates.

Israel on Wednesday approved a series of measures easing its blockade of the Gaza Strip, including opening the main commercial crossing with the Palestinian enclave to imports.

The announcement came a day after Israeli officials allowed the import of crucial construction material needed for the Gaza Strip's rebuilding following the recent conflict in May. Tensions have run high in recent weeks as Hamas activists have launched incendiary balloons into Israel, sparking a number of wildfires across the border, and staged a series of sometimes violent demonstrations along the border fence with Israel.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has spoken with the United Arab Emirates' de-facto leader, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed, by telephone, Erdogan's office said late Monday, in a sign of easing tensions between the countries.

The two discussed their countries' relations and regional issues, according to a statement from the Turkish presidency. The statement did not say when the conversation took place.

Human rights lawyers representing hundreds of victims of Yemen's civil war are calling on the International Criminal Court to open an investigation into war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly committed by the Saudi Arabia-led coalition during the devastating conflict.

British lawyer Toby Cadman filed the request Monday, highlighting three separate incidents — an August 2018 airstrike that destroyed a school bus and killed dozens; a missile attack in October 2016 that killed at least 110 people; and allegations of torture and murder of civilians being held in prisons in the south of Yemen.