Egypt and Saudi Arabia signed a pact in Cairo Thursday aimed at boosting military and economic ties between the two Arab allies.

Relations have warmed since the 2013 ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, with Saudi Arabia offering billions in aid to Egypt and Cairo participating in a Saudi-led bombing campaign against Iran-backed rebels in Yemen.

The United States began Thursday delivery of eight F-16 fighter jets to Egypt, according to its embassy in Cairo, the first since Washington fully lifted in March a freeze on arms delivery.

The operation comes as Secretary of State John Kerry's prepares to visit Cairo for a "strategic dialogue" Sunday amid a warming in ties that were strained after the army ousted president Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

A senior military officer has said Israel could attack militants affiliated to the Islamic State group in neighboring Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, if they were about to attack Israeli soldiers or civilians.

The "threat of terror from Sinai" has grown in recent years, Brigadier General Royi Elcabets said on Wednesday.

An Egyptian court postponed Thursday its verdict in the retrial of three Al-Jazeera journalists accused of supporting the banned Muslim Brotherhood, in a case that has sparked a global outcry.

Australian Peter Greste, Canadian Mohamed Fahmy and Egyptian Baher Mohamed were jailed last year for "spreading false news" during their coverage of the turmoil after the army ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

An Egyptian man was fighting for his life on Wednesday after being electrocuted at a Paris station while trying to leap onto the Eurostar train to London, said a source close to the case.

The man was electrocuted at the Gare du Nord station by an overhead power line while trying to jump from the roof of one train to another. He was taken to hospital in a critical condition, said the source.

An Egyptian police officer guarding Niger's embassy in Cairo was shot dead on Tuesday night outside the diplomatic mission by gunmen who then fled the scene, a police official said.

A second officer was wounded by the two armed men, who were on a motorcycle, according to the official. Niger's embassy is situated in southwest Cairo.

A Kuwaiti court on Tuesday sentenced four Egyptian men to death for murdering a Pakistani guard during a robbery at a construction site.

Another three Egyptians were sentenced to seven years in jail each for helping them.

At least 25 people died in a fire that gutted an Egyptian furniture factory north of Cairo on Tuesday, a health ministry official said.

Twenty-two more workers suffered from burns and smoke inhalation in the blaze in the Al-Helw factory on the outskirts of the capital, health ministry spokesman Hossam Abdel Ghaffar said.

Egyptian police killed two alleged jihadists suspected of involvement in the recent bombing of the Italian consulate in Cairo in a raid Monday on an apartment in the capital, security officials said.

The two men were killed in a gunfight when a police team went to arrest them, the officials said.

Egypt extended a state of emergency in parts of the Sinai Peninsula for three months, as a roadside bomb attack claimed by Islamic State jihadists wounded 18 policemen Sunday in the insurgency-wracked region.

The attack happened near El-Arish, the capital of North Sinai province where the army is battling IS loyalists, according to security officials, who said the policemen were on leave.