Islamic State group fighters attempting to retake a town in northern Iraq held by Kurdish peshmerga forces have killed at least 30 Kurds, an Iraqi military spokesman said Sunday.

The fighting began Saturday as the extremists approached the town of Gwer, just outside of the northern city of Mosul, which the Islamic State group controls, said Halgurd Hekmat, a spokesman for Iraqi Kurdish forces in Irbil. Hekmat said he had no information about casualties suffered by the Islamic State group.

Human Rights Watch on Sunday urged the Yemeni government to "credibly" investigate the killing of a prominent southern separatist while he was being arrested during a protest.

Khaled al-Junaidi, a well-known figure in the Southern Movement, was shot in the chest when security forces opened fire while trying to arrest him on December 15, activists told Agence France Presse at the time.

Clashes between Berbers and Arabs in the southern Algerian town of Ghardaia wounded 10 people Saturday, including two gendarmes, national news agency APS reported.

The fighting erupted when Mozabite (Berbers) youth tried to prevent  a group of Arabs, or Chaamba, from going to a mosque located in a majority Mozabite neighborhood, the agency said.

Car bombs killed at least 16 people, most of them civilians, when they targeted al-Qaida and Kurdish fighters Saturday in Syria's northern province of Aleppo, a monitor said.

The first bomb hit a checkpoint manned by fighters from al-Nusra Front, al-Qaida's Syria franchise, killing 12 people, said the head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdel Rahman.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told French Jews Saturday, after 17 people were killed there during three days of Islamist attacks, that Israel is their home. 

"To all the Jews of France, all the Jews of Europe, I would like to say that Israel is not just the place in whose direction you pray, the state of Israel is your home," he said in a televised statement, referring to the Jewish practice of facing Jerusalem during prayer.

Militants from the Islamic State jihadist group launched a surprise attack on Kurdish forces in the Gwer area of north Iraq, killing 26, security officials said Saturday.

The militants crossed the Zab river by boat and occupied Gwer -- some 40 kilometers (25 miles) southwest of Kurdish regional capital Arbil -- for about an hour before being pushed back, the officials said.

Hundreds of Yemenis took to the streets of Sanaa Saturday to protest attacks by al-Qaida, including a bombing at a police academy that killed dozens.

The demonstration organized by a youth group calling itself the Rafd (Rejection) Movement also protested against the presence of Shiite militiamen in Sanaa and other parts of the country, an AFP reporter said.

The United Nations announced Saturday a new round of peace talks in Geneva next week between Libya's warring factions, as the European Union warned the country was at a "crucial juncture".

It came as fighting between troops and Islamist militia killed 13 people in eastern Libya.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the purpose of the private meeting was "to express his gratitude for their longstanding and strong relationship."

The sultan has not returned to Oman since traveling overseas for medical tests six months ago for suspected cancer, stirring fears over stability in his Gulf country.

Kuwait authorities arrested a former liberal cabinet minister as he attempted to leave the country Saturday, after being sentenced to a week in jail over an article criticizing the government, his lawyer said.

Saad al-Ajmi, information minister between 1999-2000, was detained at the airport as he, his wife and daughter were trying to leave for a pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia, Al-Humaidi al-Subaie said on Twitter.