A senior Iranian official visited the United Arab Emirates on Thursday, just days after Tehran agreed to restore diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia in a Chinese-brokered deal that raised hopes of a broader rapprochement across Middle East.

Ali Shamkhani, the head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, said his visit was a "meaningful beginning for the two countries to enter a new stage of political, economic and security relations," Iran's state-run IRNA news agency reported.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting Germany's leaders Thursday on an abbreviated visit that comes in the shadow of tensions over his government's planned overhaul of Israel's judicial system and worries about Iran's nuclear program.

Netanyahu has meetings scheduled with Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Germany's largely ceremonial president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, on his one-day trip to Berlin.

Iran has agreed to stop sending weapons to the Houthi rebels in Yemen as part of a China-brokered deal with Saudi Arabia, U.S. and Saudi officials said.

The Wall Street Journal, an American daily, quoted Thursday U.S. and Saudi officials as saying that if Tehran does stop arming the Houthis, it could put pressure on the militant group to reach a deal to end the conflict.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant visited Thursday the Lebanese border, after Israel said an armed man suspected of blowing up a car may have come from Lebanon.

Gallant threatened that "whoever decided to test Israel" by perpetrating the roadside bombing in the country's northern region "will pay dearly."

Israeli protesters pressed ahead on Thursday with demonstrations against a contentious government plan to overhaul the judiciary, pushing back against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after he rejected a compromise proposal that was meant to defuse the crisis.

Despite the effort by the country's figurehead president, Isaac Herzog, to seek a way out of the stalemate, the sides appeared to be further digging in. Netanyahu and his allies were set to barrel forward with their original plan despite weeks of mass protests and widespread opposition from across Israeli society and beyond as well as warnings by Herzog that Israel was headed toward an "abyss."

In a matter of days, Saudi Arabia carried out blockbuster agreements with the world's two leading powers — China and the United States.

Riyadh signed a Chinese-facilitated deal aimed at restoring diplomatic ties with its arch-nemesis Iran and then announced a massive contract to buy commercial planes from U.S. manufacturer Boeing.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said he will only meet President Recep Tayyip Erdogan if Turkey withdraws troops from northern Syria, according to a Russian media interview published on Thursday.

His comments come one day after he met Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is seeking to repair ties between Erdogan and Assad severed after the 2011 Syrian war.

Israel has signaled to the European Union's foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, that he is not welcome to visit following critical comments he made about Israeli policies in the occupied West Bank, Israeli officials said Wednesday.

The incident marked the latest sign of deteriorating relations between Israel' s new far-right government and some of its closest allies.

Thousands of Syrians demonstrated in the war-ravaged country's rebel-held northwest on Wednesday, marking 12 years since the start of pro-democracy protests and rejecting any international "normalization" with Damascus.

The brutal repression of the 2011 protests, which began during the Arab Spring uprisings, triggered a bloody and complex civil war that has claimed more than 500,000 lives and left millions displaced.

Saudi Arabia could start making investments in Iran "very quickly" after they agreed to restore diplomatic ties, the Saudi finance minister said on Wednesday, despite sweeping US sanctions against the Islamic republic.

Mohammed Al-Jadaan said there were "a lot of opportunities" in Iran and that he couldn't see any reason to prevent investments taking place between the two Gulf heavyweights.