Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's justice minister has unveiled the new government's long-promised overhaul of the judicial system that aims to weaken the country's Supreme Court.

Critics accused the government of declaring war against the legal system, saying the plan will upend Israel's system of checks and balances and undermine its democratic institutions by giving absolute power to the most right-wing coalition in the country's history.

The United Arab Emirates' top diplomat has met with Syrian President Bashar Assad, his second visit to Damascus as relations continue to thaw between the two countries.

According to a statement from Assad's office, he and UAE's Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan discussed boosting economic ties between their nations. It quoted Assad as saying that the restoration of ties between the two countries is in the interest of regional stability.

The Israeli military has demolished homes, water tanks and olive orchards in two Palestinian villages in the southern West Bank where some residents are at risk of imminent expulsion, residents and activists said Wednesday.

One of the villages whose structures were demolished on Tuesday is part of an arid area of the West Bank known as Masafer Yatta, which the Israeli military has designated as a live-fire training zone. Some 1,000 residents of the eight hamlets that make up Masafer Yatta are slated for expulsion, an order Israel's Supreme Court upheld in May after a two-decade legal battle.

Palestinian lawyer and activist Salah Hammouri vowed to keep up his fight for the rights of the Palestinian people despite his deportation to France following Israel's claim that he has ties to a banned militant group.

Hammouri, who holds French citizenship, landed in Paris on Dec. 18 following months of legal wrangling, despite France's public opposition to the expulsion.

A Tunisian former environment minister has been sentenced to three years in prison for his role in the illegal import of 280 containers of waste from Italy, local media reported Wednesday.

Mustapha Aroui and several ministry officials had been sacked and arrested in December 2020 as public anger mounted and authorities investigated how the waste had been imported.

Two rockets struck a base housing American troops in eastern Syria on Wednesday without causing any human or material losses, the U.S. military said.

The morning attack on Mission Support Site Conoco came as Iran and its allies in the region marked the third anniversary of the killing of Iran's elite Quds force chief Gen. Qassem Soleimani, in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad.

A global energy company has acquired oil producing facilities in war-torn Yemen from another international firm. The move comes as the country's Houthi rebels have repeatedly targeted terminals and tankers in efforts to stop their rivals from exporting oil.

Zenith Netherlands, a subsidiary of Zenith Energy Ltd., announced that it has agreed to acquire energy assets of Vienna-based OMV in Yemen, in a deal worth more than $21.6 million.

A Bidoon poet and activist who holds U.S. citizenship has said that Kuwait was deporting her against her will after she traveled to the oil-rich nation to visit her family.

Mona Kareem, 35, told The Associated Press that she had been at Kuwait International Airport for hours after facing interrogation following her arrival on a flight from Beirut. She comes from Kuwait's so-called Bidoon community, which is largely made up of descendants of desert nomads considered stateless by the government.

The United Nations and the United States led a chorus of international criticism of a visit by Israel's extreme-right new national security minister to Jerusalem's super-sensitive Al-Aqsa mosque compound on Tuesday.

Younis al-Shaer left Gaza dreaming of a better life in Europe, only to return to the Palestinian enclave in a coffin.