The UAE has issued its first civil marriage license for a non-Muslim couple, state media reported, as the Gulf country seeks to keep its edge over regional competitors. 

The United Arab Emirates -- where foreigners make up 90 percent of the approximately 10-million population -- has been amending its laws to present itself as a modernizing force in a largely conservative region. 

Israel's government minister for public security has said he is now under round-the-clock protection after coming under threats from Jewish extremists.

Omer Barlev also accused members of Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's pro-settler Yemina party of contributing to the fraught atmosphere.

Syria has said that Israel's plans to double the number of settlers living in Israeli-annexed Golan Heights are "dangerous and unprecedented" and only perpetuate its occupation of the territory.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett announced on Sunday a multimillion-dollar plan meant to double the number of settlers living in the region that Israel captured from Syria more than five decades ago.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said Tuesday he is not opposed to a "good" nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, but voiced skepticism that such an outcome would emerge from the current negotiations.

Bennett spoke a day after negotiators from Iran and five world powers resumed talks in Vienna on restoring Tehran's tattered 2015 nuclear deal. He reiterated that Israel was not bound by any accord, leaving it room to maneuver militarily.

Yemen's Huthi rebels said Tuesday they have allowed the temporary resumption of U.N. aid flights into the capital Sanaa, a week after a halt due to Saudi-led coalition air strikes.

"The civil aviation authority announces the resumption of U.N. and other organization flights into Sanaa airport on a temporary basis," the rebel-run Al-Masirah television reported.

An Israeli air strike hit Syria's Latakia port before dawn on Tuesday, sparking a fire that lit up the Mediterranean seafront in the second such attack on the key cargo hub this month, Syrian state media reported.

Since the outbreak of Syria's civil war in 2011, Israel has routinely carried out air strikes on its strife-torn neighbor, mostly targeting Syrian government troops as well as allied Iran-backed forces and Hizbullah fighters.

A French-Syrian man has been detained by French police on suspicion of supplying components for the manufacture of chemical weapons in Syria through his shipping company, sources briefed on the case told AFP.

Saudi Arabia on Monday executed a Yemeni man accused of plotting a suicide attack in the kingdom and of links to the Islamic State jihadist group, the interior ministry said.  

Iraq's supreme court on Monday rejected a motion filed by the Hashed al-Shaabi ex-paramilitary alliance contesting its defeat in the October 10 parliamentary election.

"The Federal Court has decided to reject the complaint... and to make the plaintiffs bear the costs," Judge Jassem Mohamed Aboud said, reading out the verdict.

Libyan lawmakers met Monday to discuss the myriad challenges that forced a postponement of the long-awaited presidential election this month. The postponement was a major blow to international efforts to end a decade of chaos in the oil-rich North African country.

The vote has faced many obstacles, including controversial presidential hopefuls, disputes over laws governing the elections, and occasional infighting among armed groups.