Satellite photos published by a Washington think tank on Wednesday appear to show Syrian efforts to conceal a second suspected nuclear site allegedly linked to a reactor bombed by Israel in 2007.

The photos acquired by the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) indicate Syria tried to cover up its nuclear activities after the air raid, and could lead the U.N. nuclear watchdog to step up demands for inspections.

Forty-nine Somali migrants drowned when their boat capsized during heavy winds in the Gulf of Aden off Yemen's southern coast, the Yemeni interior ministry said Thursday.

The migrants who were attempting to reach Yemen, "drowned off the coast of Bir Ali in the south ... when their boat capsized four nautical miles offshore" during a wind storm on Tuesday, a ministry statement said.

Israeli jets bombed several Hamas camps in the Gaza Strip early Thursday after Palestinians fired a rocket that slammed into a house in a southern Israeli city, the military said.

There were no immediate reports of casualties in the air force strikes or from the rocket that landed in the city of Beersheva, the first time the city has been targeted since Israel's devastating 2009 Gaza offensive.

An Israeli tank wounded eleven Palestinians, two critically, when it opened fire on a group of militants east of Gaza City on Wednesday, an emergency services spokesman said.

"Eleven Palestinians were injured by tank shell in an area east of Gaza City. Two of them are in critical condition," Adham Abu Selmiya of the Hamas-run rescue service told Agence France Presse, saying they had been taken to the city's Shifa hospital.

The NATO military alliance said Wednesday it was monitoring two Iranian warships that have entered the Mediterranean Sea, a presence that has unnerved Israel.

"We follow events in the region and we follow these two Iranian warships with as much interest as we do any other warships in the region," said NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu.

Europe moved Wednesday to isolate Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, with France calling for sanctions and a freeze in financial relations while Italy accused the veteran strongman of perpetrating a bloodbath.

With hundreds killed in a week of raging protests, Europe has struggled with how to exercise leverage against Gadhafi, in power for more than 41 years and whose country provides Europe with a large slice of its energy needs.

A fighter pilot disobeyed orders on Wednesday to bomb the opposition stronghold of Benghazi and ditched his plane after he and his co-pilot ejected, a Libyan newspaper reported on its website.

The Russian-made Sukhoi 22 crashed near Ajdabiya, 160 kilometers west of the city which has fallen to anti-regime protesters, a military source said, quoted in Quryna newspaper.

Iran's president said Wednesday he is certain the wave of unrest in the Middle East will spread to Europe and North America, bringing an end to governments he accused of oppressing and humiliating people.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose own country resorted to violence to disperse an opposition rally earlier this month, also condemned Libya's use of force against demonstrators, calling it "grotesque."

King Abdullah Returns to Riyadh, Boosts Social Benefits

Saudi King Abdullah arrived in his homeland Wednesday after three months abroad, boosting social benefits for his people as he returned to a Middle East rocked by anti-regime uprisings.

Bahraini authorities have released 23 Shiite activists who were being held on charges of terrorism after a pardon by King Hamad, an opposition MP told Agence France Presse on Wednesday.

"The 23 have been released," said MP Jassem Hussein, a member of the Islamic National Accord Association, which controls the largest bloc in the 40-strong parliament.