A civilian plane was engulfed in flames Wednesday after Yemen's Huthi rebels launched a drone strike on an airport in southern Saudi Arabia, days after the U.S. moved to delist the insurgents as terrorists.

Populist Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr said Wednesday he backed early elections overseen by the U.N., in a rare press conference outside his home in the Iraqi shrine city of Najaf.

A Qatari minister met the newly-arrived Saudi envoy to Doha on Wednesday, Qatar said in a statement, as the neighbors continue to restore ties abruptly cut in 2017.

The United Arab Emirates' "Hope" probe on Tuesday successfully entered Mars' orbit, mission officials said, becoming the first Arab country to reach the Red Planet.

Arab foreign ministers on Monday reaffirmed their commitment to a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, warning against "any unilateral moves" by Israel.

The Islamic State group on Monday ambushed a regime convoy in eastern Syria, killing at least 26 fighters, a Britain-based war monitor said.

Key Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas opened talks Monday in Cairo aimed at clearing the way for the first elections in the West Bank and Gaza since 2006, Egypt's state television said.

Yemen's Iran-backed Huthi rebels have resumed an offensive to seize the government's last northern stronghold of Marib, a government source said Monday, with dozens of casualties on both sides. 

Three young Saudis from the minority Shiite community had their death sentences commuted to 10 years in prison Sunday, officials said, as the kingdom seeks to improve its human rights record.

Ali al-Nimr, Dawood al-Marhoon and Abdullah al-Zaher were arrested as minors in 2012 on terrorism-related charges after they took part in anti-government protests during the Arab Spring uprisings.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denied corruption charges against him in a brief court appearance Monday, as his graft trial intensifies weeks before a fourth national election inside two years.