A delegation of Russian officials arrived in Damascus on Tuesday for the first such visit to Syria since the fall of former President Bashar Assad.

Assad, an ally of Moscow, took refuge in Russia after his ouster in December in a lightning rebel offensive.

They walked for hours loaded with whatever clothes, food and blankets they could carry. Many smiled, some hugged loved ones they hadn't seen for months. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians filled Gaza's main coastal road as they streamed back to homes in the north.

The mood was joyous, even though many knew their homes had been destroyed in Israeli offensives against Hamas that leveled large parts of Gaza City and the surrounding north.

Israeli authorities say they have arrested two Israeli citizens for allegedly conducting missions on behalf of Iran, the latest in a string of similar cases announced in recent months.

A statement from the Israeli police and the Shin Ben internal security agency on Monday said that Yuri Eliasfov and Georgi Andreev, residents of northern Israel, were in contact with an Iranian agent and carried out various missions under his instruction.

U.S. President Donald Trump's suggestion that Egypt and Jordan take in Palestinians from the war-ravaged Gaza Strip was met with a hard "no" Sunday from the two U.S. allies along with the Palestinians themselves, who fear Israel would never allow them to return.

Trump floated the idea on Saturday, saying he would urge the leaders of the two Arab countries to take in Gaza's now largely homeless population, so that "we just clean out that whole thing." He added that resettling most of Gaza's population of 2.3 million could be temporary or long term.

Tens of thousands of Palestinians returned to the most heavily destroyed part of the Gaza Strip on Monday as Israel lifted its closure of the north for the first time since the early weeks of the 15-month war with Hamas in accordance with a fragile ceasefire.

Massive crowds of people carrying their belongings on foot stretched along a main highway running next to the coast in a stunning reversal of the mass exodus from the north at the start of the war, which many Palestinians had feared Israel would make permanent.

The United States, the world's biggest donor, has frozen virtually all foreign aid, making exceptions only for emergency food, and military funding for Israel and Egypt.

Hamas militants handed over four captive female Israeli soldiers to the Red Cross in Gaza City on Saturday. Israel was set to release 200 Palestinian detainees later in the day as part of the fragile ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

As the four were released, hundreds of people cheered in Tel Aviv's Hostages Square where they were watching the drama unfold on a big screen television.

When Dania Hanatsheh was released from an Israeli jail this week and dropped off by bus into a sea of jubilant Palestinians in Ramallah, it was an uncomfortable déjà vu.

After nearly five months of detention, it was the second time the 22-year-old woman had been freed as part of a deal between Israel and Hamas to pause the war in Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be flying high.

Israel's enemies across the region have been badly weakened during 15 months of war. Israeli hostages have begun to come home from captivity in Gaza, and Netanyahu's good friend, Donald Trump, is back in the White House.

Experts from the U.S. Air Force are looking at ways to upgrade Cyprus' premier air base for use as a humanitarian staging post in future operations in the Middle East, a Cypriot official told The Associated Press Thursday.

Cyprus, which is only 184 kilometers (114 miles) from the Lebanese capital, Beirut, has acted as a transit point for the r epatriation of foreign nationals fleeing conflict in the Middle East and beyond on numerous occasions in the past. It has also served as a transit point for humanitarian aid to Gaza.