Kazakhstan said Wednesday it will stop hosting talks aimed at resolving Syria's 12-year-old conflict. The abrupt announcement surprised Russia and other participants as they wrapped up the 20th round of talks in the capital of Astana.

Since 2017, the former Soviet republic has provided a venue for talks to representatives of Russia, Turkey, Syria and Iran on ways to resolve the Syrian war.

The Advisory Commission (AdCom) on the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) convened in Beirut on Wednesday and Thursday, amid immense concern over the alarming financial situation of the Agency.

In the two-day session, chaired by Dr. Bassel El Hassan, Chairman of the Lebanese Palestinian Dialogue Committee (LPDC), AdCom members actively engaged the UNRWA senior management on key issues related to the survival of the Agency and its services to Palestine Refugees.  

Israeli police has fired tear gas, sponge-tipped bullets and a water cannon during mass demonstrations by Druze Arabs in the Golan Heights — a rare burst of violence in the normally quiet area. At least 20 people were reported injured.

Thousands of Druze residents of the Golan took part in the demonstrations against the construction of massive wind turbines. The windswept area is an ideal spot for the turbines, but residents fear damage to their properties and landowners have said they did not understand the agreements they signed with a local power company, according to Israeli media.

Israeli forces demolished the house of an alleged Palestinian attacker in Nablus in the occupied West Bank early on Thursday, witnesses and the army said.

The army said it "demolished overnight in Nablus the home of Kamal Jouri, the terrorist who carried out a gun attack" which "caused the death of soldier Ido Baruch".

Hundreds of Israeli settlers on Wednesday stormed into a Palestinian town in the occupied West Bank, setting fire to dozens of cars and homes to avenge the deaths of four Israelis killed by Palestinian gunmen the previous day, residents said.

The settler attack came as the Israeli military deployed additional forces across the occupied West Bank, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced plans to build 1,000 new settler homes in response to the deadly shooting.

Israelis and Palestinians held funerals Wednesday for teenagers killed in a shooting targeting Israelis and an army raid on a Palestinian city, as violence rages in the occupied West Bank.

Mourners gathered in the Israeli settlement of Shilo around the shrouded body of 17-year-old Nahman Mordof.

Iran's top diplomat arrived Wednesday in Oman for meetings with senior officials, a day after Tehran held discussions in Doha on its nuclear program with Qatari and European Union officials.

Hossein Amir-Abdollahian is on a tour of the Gulf that will see the Iranian foreign minister also making stops later in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.

After a spate of arrests and executions for drug offences, Ibrahim, a dealer in Saudi Arabia, is not taking any chances.

"I don't deal with new clients or go to the clients myself," said the 37-year-old, using a pseudonym to protect his identity.

Two Palestinian attackers have opened fire at a restaurant and gas station near an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, killing four Israelis and wounding several other people before they were shot dead, authorities said, as violence roiled the occupied territory the day after a deadly Israeli military raid.

Israeli settlers attempted to carry out revenge attacks across the northern West Bank, raising fears of a repeat of a rampage last February that resulted in damage to dozens of Palestinian homes and vehicles and the killing of a Palestinian man.

Israeli forces arrested three people Wednesday in a Palestinian village which the military said was home to assailants who killed four Jews near a settlement in the occupied West Bank.

The army said Israeli forces detained three "wanted people" in Orif village in the northern West Bank.