Turkey's top court ruled on Thursday that a blanket ban on YouTube violated individual rights and freedoms, clearing the way for the popular video-sharing site to come back. 

YouTube has been banned in Turkey since March 27 after the site was used to spread audio recordings where senior government, military and intelligence officials are allegedly heard weighing possible military action inside war-torn Syria.

A Turkish court on Thursday handed a 15-month jail term to a teacher over Twitter posts deemed religiously offensive, local media reported on Thursday.

The court in the eastern city of Mus ruled that the man, identified as Ertan P., insulted Islamic values with his Twitter handle -- @allah (cc) --  and a series of tweets he posted, Hurriyet newspaper reported on its website.

Turkey has seen a year of turmoil from a corruption scandal to a mining disaster since mass anti-government protests shook the country, and with new demonstrations planned for this weekend, analysts say the events of Taksim Square have not been forgotten. 

Last year's protests, which started as a small campaign to save Istanbul's Gezi Park from redevelopment, eventually drew an estimated three million protesters.

A young man who was shot dead during last week's police crackdown on protesters in Istanbul was killed by a bullet fired from a policeman's gun, local media said Thursday.

Ugur Kurt, 30, died of gunshot wounds to the head after being caught in the crossfire during clashes between police and protesters in Istanbul's restive Okmeydani district.

Israeli officials denounced as "political" Wednesday attempts by a Turkish court to secure an international arrest warrant for four former Israeli military commanders over a deadly 2010 maritime assault.

But the court ruling, issued on Monday, was unlikely to have a "significant effect" on attempts to restore full diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey, which were badly damaged by the raid, officials said.

A Turkish Airlines security coordinator in Mogadishu was killed in a drive-by shooting on Tuesday, officials said.

"A vehicle carrying Turkish Airlines staff in Mogadishu came under attack," Turkish Airlines spokesman Ali Genc wrote on Twitter, naming the victim as Saadettin Dogan.

Armenia on Tuesday invited Turkey's leader to events next year marking the 100th anniversary of World War I-era massacres that Armenians say amounted to genocide, despite Ankara's fierce rejection of the term.

Relations between the two countries have long been soured by disputes over the massacres, in which Armenians say up to 1.5 million people were killed in what is now Turkey as the Ottoman Empire was falling apart.

A Turkish court on Monday ordered the arrest of four former Israeli military chiefs over a deadly 2010 maritime assault, in a move which could jeopardize reconciliation efforts between the countries.

The court in Istanbul will ask Interpol to issue international arrest warrants for four men involved in a deadly raid on a Gaza-bound aid ship, Cihat Gokdemir, a lawyer working on the case, told Agence France Presse.

Turkish police on Monday arrested at least 20 people across Istanbul for taking part in last week's deadly anti-government protests, local media reported.

Anti-terror police units, backed by helicopters, sealed off the restive district of Okmeydani where two people were killed during battles between law enforcement officers and protestors, NTV television channel reported.

Thousands of people from Turkey's minority Alevi community on Sunday held protests over the deaths of two people during a police crackdown on demonstrators earlier in the week.

Protestors flocked to rallies in Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir to call for an end to discrimination after two men were caught up in clashes between police and protesters in a predominantly Alevi district on Thursday and killed.