Israeli warplanes on Thursday shot down over the Mediterranean a drone controlled by the Gaza Strip's Islamist rulers Hamas, the army said.

Yemeni government forces made gains around the Red Sea coastal town of Mokha in heavy fighting overnight as they rebuffed a rebel counter-offensive, a military source said on Thursday.

Turkish-backed Syrian rebels said Thursday they had fully captured the town of Al-Bab from the Islamic State group, marking a key defeat for the jihadists after weeks of heavy fighting.

As Ankara said its allies now had "near complete control" of the town, a fresh round of peace talks opened between the Syrian opposition and regime in Geneva.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday backed pardoning a soldier sentenced to 18 months in prison for shooting dead a wounded Palestinian assailant, media reported. 

"I am still in favour of pardoning Private Azaria," Netanyahu told reporters accompanying him on an official visit to Australia, Israel's Channel 10 said. 

Several hundred pro-Palestinian protesters demonstrated in Sydney on Thursday against the first visit to Australia by an Israeli prime minister, branding Benjamin Netanyahu a "war criminal".

A police helicopter hovered over the city as speakers slammed Canberra's strong support of Netanyahu and his government.

Rocket fire by Yemeni rebels killed a policeman and wounded a civilian on the Saudi side of the border, the civil defence department said late on Wednesday.

They were the latest casualties inside the kingdom since Saudi Arabia began leading an Arab military coalition that intervened in its southern neighbour to support President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi in March 2015.

Iraqi forces on Thursday entered Mosul airport, which lies on the southern edge of the city, for the first time since the Islamic State group overran the region in 2014.

Backed by jets, gunships and drones, forces blitzed their way across open areas south of Mosul and entered the airport compound, apparently meeting limited resistance but strafing the area for suspected snipers.

France is committed to a two-state solution for the Middle East conflict, President Francois Hollande said Wednesday, a week after Donald Trump broke with international consensus by stepping back from the goal.

Russia has called on Syrian President Bashar Assad to stop his bombing campaign while peace talks take place this week, but a political breakthrough on the six-year war remains unlikely, the U.N.'s envoy said Wednesday.

The United Nations raised concerns Wednesday over newly announced demolition plans in a Palestinian Bedouin village in the occupied West Bank that threaten dozens of buildings including a primary school.