Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was hospitalized on Thursday for a heart test and later discharged, with the 81-year-old's health reported to be normal, officials said.

The U.N.'s Syria envoy on Thursday made an impassioned appeal to save eastern Aleppo, warning the city faced total destruction and urging Islamist fighters to leave so civilians can get aid.

Syrian government forces advanced against rebels inside Aleppo on Thursday, making their biggest gains in the ravaged city in years just hours after announcing they would ease their air bombardment.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said loyalist fighters now controlled around half of the Bustan al-Basha district near the centre of the divided metropolis.

A Bahraini court Thursday postponed until October 31 its verdict in the trial of prominent activist Nabeel Rajab, charged with spreading false information and posting online insults, a judicial source said.

The criminal court, with Rajab present behind bars, was scheduled to give its verdict at Thursday's hearing.

A group of women activists who tried to break Israel's decade-long blockade of the Gaza Strip were being held Thursday pending deportation after the Israeli navy intercepted their boat.

Thirteen women, including Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire, were detained on Wednesday evening after their sailboat was stopped around 35 nautical miles off the coast of Gaza.

Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards warned regional rival Saudi Arabia to stay away from Iranian waters during its military exercises in the Gulf.

"The naval forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps believe this military exercise is a clear instance of creating tensions and undermining the stable security of the Persian Gulf," it said in a statement published by Iranian newspapers on Thursday.

Moscow's year-long bombing campaign in Syria has showcased the "reliability" of Russian weaponry, as the Kremlin has helped stabilise the war-ravaged country, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said Thursday. 

At least 29 Syrian rebels were killed in a blast at a border crossing with Turkey on Thursday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The Britain-based monitoring group said it was unclear what caused the explosion at the Atme crossing between Turkey and the northern Syrian province of Idlib, adding that around 20 people had also been wounded.

The White House accused Israel of a betrayal of trust Wednesday, in an unusually sharp rebuke over its plans to build hundreds of new settlement homes deep in the West Bank.

Days after President Barack Obama approved a $38 billion Israeli military aid package and attended former president Shimon Peres's funeral in Jerusalem, the White House railed at the construction of 300 housing units on land "far closer to Jordan than Israel."

With diplomacy faltering and Aleppo under siege, President Barack Obama is considering fresh Syria sanctions that could claw deeper into the regime and target its Russian backers.