The armed wing of the Hamas movement which rules Gaza threatened Saturday to end a three-day-old Egyptian-brokered truce with Israel following a flurry of air strikes.

"The air raids by the Zionist enemy are new crimes. We will not stay silent in the face of the crimes," a statement from the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades said.

Yemeni troops took control on Saturday of the southeastern town of Azzan, a known Al-Qaida bastion, after the group's fighters left it a week ago, an official said.

Thirty-five people, meanwhile, were killed in the southern Abyan province over the past 10 days in explosions from landmines laid by Al-Qaida fighters before they fled from the province, officials said.

Saudi Arabia is set to pay the salaries of the rebel Free Syrian Army to encourage mass defections from President Bashar Assad's forces, Britain's Guardian newspaper reported on Saturday.

The payments would be made in either U.S. dollars or euros -- which would mean a rise in salaries as the Syrian pound has fallen sharply in value since the revolt started 16 months ago, the broadsheet said.

Syrian President Bashar Assad issued a decree on Saturday forming a new government, state television said, less than two months after controversial parliamentary elections boycotted by the opposition.

"President Bashar Assad has issued Decree 210 forming a new government under prime minister Dr Riad Hijab," the television said.

At least 40 people were killed on Saturday in violence across Syria, the majority by regime forces who shelled rebel bastions and clashed with opposition fighters in several areas, a watchdog said.

The casualties included at least 10 regime troops who had tried to desert in Damascus province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Three Palestinians were killed and an Israeli wounded in air raids and rocket fire Saturday, medics said, as the armed wing of Hamas threatened to call off an Egypt-brokered truce.

"The air raids by the Zionist enemy are new crimes. We will not stay silent in the face of the crimes," said Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades of the Islamist movement Hamas which rules the Gaza Strip.

Turkey said Saturday its downed fighter jet may have violated Syrian airspace after Damascus confirmed shooting it down, sparking a fresh crisis amid nosediving ties between the erstwhile allies.

President Abdullah Gul said it was routine for warplanes flying at high speed to cross borders, in comments that showed signs of easing tensions in the spat over the shooting in the eastern Mediterranean.

Hundreds of Palestinians and peace activists on Friday held a protest at the West Bank village Susiya, which Israel has recently served demolition orders.

An Agence France Presse correspondent said over 500 people demonstrated at the site, located in the southernmost part of the West Bank, carrying signs against the evacuation and demolition of the 50 structures comprising the hamlet.

Yemeni security forces shot dead two people taking part in a protest in the port city of Aden on Friday for the secession of the formerly independent south, activists and a medic said.

"Security forces fired live rounds on protesters, killing two and wounding five," said Ghassan al-Shuaibi, an activist from the separatist Southern Movement.

Bahraini security forces on Friday fired rubber bullets to disperse an unauthorized rally by the opposition Al-Wefaq wounding its leader, the Shiite bloc said.

Sheikh Ali Salman was "wounded with rubber bullets in his shoulder and back when security forces fired at a peaceful demonstration held in Bilad al-Qadeem," three kilometers (two miles) from Manama, it said in a statement.