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A silent crowd gathered in the Syrian capital, Damascus, on Friday to press the new authorities about the fate of relatives who went missing under Bashar al-Assad and to demand justice for their loved ones.

Dozens of sombre protesters holding pictures of the disappeared assembled in central Damascus's Hijaz Square, an AFP journalist said.

"It is time for tyrants to be held accountable," read a black banner unfurled from the balcony of the elegant Ottoman-era train station.

Other placards read: "Revealing the fate of the missing is a right," and "I don't want an unmarked grave for my son, I want the truth."

The fate of tens of thousands of people who disappeared under Assad is a key question after more than 13 years of devastating civil war that saw upwards of half a million people killed.

Journalist Mohammed al-Sharif was detained during Israel's raid of Kamal Adwan Hospital - Al Jazeera reports.

Huge crowds demonstrated in Yemen's capital on Friday, a day after Israeli strikes in response to missile and drone attacks by the Iran-backed group.

Tens of thousands of people gathered in Houthi-held Sanaa, chanting and brandishing Kalashnikovs, placards and pistols as they listened to fiery anti-Israel speeches.

Large-scale demonstrations are a regular occurrence in Sanaa under the Houthis but Friday's protest followed a surge in hostilities with Israel, which struck multiple sites on Thursday.

A UN worker hurt in an airstrike on Yemen's main international airport on Thursday has been evacuated to Jordan for further medical treatment, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X on Friday.

Today we managed to evacuate our colleague who was injured in yesterday’s attack on Sana’a airport in . We are now in , where he will receive further medical treatment.

Deepest gratitude to the UNHAS team for their service and swift evacuation from…

— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros)

(Reuters)

Protesters in West Jerusalem held a rally against Israel's ongoing war in Gaza, carrying banners and placards.

Israeli police tried to prevent the demonstrators from marching.

Nearly 31,000 Syrians have returned home since the fall of strongman Bashar al-Assad, Turkey's interior minister said Friday, the figure rising by about 5,000 in just three days.

"The number of people who went back is 30,663," Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya told TGRT news channel, saying "30 percent" of them had been born in Turkey.

On Tuesday, Yerlikaya said more than 25,000 Syrians had returned in remarks to state news agency Anadolou, saying they would be allowed to leave and re-enter Turkey three times in the first half of 2025.

Ankara would also open "a migration management office" in Aleppo, Syria's second city, where most of the refugees living in Turkey are from, he said Friday, without giving further details.

France "strongly condemns" missile and drone strikes by the Houthis against Israel, a spokesman for the foreign ministry in Paris said Friday, after the group claimed attacks on Israeli targets.

"France reiterates that these attacks, as well as many others perpetrated by Huthis against commercial shipping in the Red Sea and against Israeli territory since over a year ago, are unacceptable, destabilising and must cease immediately," the spokesman said, adding that France remained committed "to regional stability and the security of Israel".

The Israeli army has committed three massacres in the Gaza Strip in 24 hours - according to medical sources.

The attacks have resulted in 37 civilians being killed and 98 injured.

Some 50 tonnes of EU-funded medical supplies flown to Turkey from Dubai are expected to enter Syria on 31 December, a UN health official told AFP on Friday.

The supplies, sent from a European Union stockpile in Dubai, landed in Istanbul early Thursday and were to be driven to the border in the coming days.

"The supplies are still in Istanbul and going through the customs process," Mrinalini Santhanam from the World Health Organization's Gaziantep office in southern Turkey told AFP, saying they would be driven south and likely cross the border into Syria "on December 31."

The aim is to support Syria's overstretched healthcare system, which has been battered by years of war under strongman Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted by rebels on 8 December.

The shipment includes 8,000 emergency surgical kits, anaesthetic supplies, IV fluids, sterilisation materials and medications to prevent disease outbreaks, with the EU saying it would be sent to support "healthcare systems in Idlib and northern Aleppo".

"The supplies are mainly trauma and surgical kits that will enable doctors in Syria to deliver thousands of surgical operations and to care (for) injured patients," WHO planning analyst Lorenzo Dal Monte told AFP when the shipment landed at Istanbul airport early Thursday.

The Israeli military reported launching an operation on Friday near one of northern Gaza's last functioning hospitals, while Gaza officials accused it of storming the facility.

The military claimed in a statement that the hospital had become "a key stronghold for terrorist organisations and continues to be used as a hideout for terrorist operatives" since Israeli forces began an incursion in northern Gaza in October.

Acting on intelligence regarding "terrorist infrastructure and operatives" in the hospital's vicinity, the military said it began operations there on Friday.

"The troops are conducting targeted operations in the area, while mitigating harm to uninvolved civilians, patients, and medical personnel," it added.

Iran's top diplomat warned Friday against "destructive interference" in Syria's future and said decisions should lie solely with the country's people, writing in Chinese state media as he visited Beijing.

Iran "considers the decision-making about the future of Syria to be the sole responsibility of the people... without destructive interference or foreign imposition," Abbas Araghchi wrote in a Chinese-language article in People's Daily published on Friday.

He also emphasized Iran's respect for Syria's "unity, national sovereignty and territorial integrity".

Araghchi touched down in the Chinese capital on Friday afternoon, Iranian state media reported, to begin his first official visit to the country since being appointed foreign minister.

The UN air crew member hurt in an air strike on Yemen's main international airport on Thursday suffered serious injuries but is now recovering in hospital, a spokesperson for the World Health Organisation said on Friday.

Israel said it struck multiple targets linked to the Iran-aligned Houthi movement in Yemen, including Sanaa International Airport, and Houthi media said at least six people were killed.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was in the airport waiting to depart when the aerial bombardment took place and said that a member of his plane's crew was injured.

The injured man, who worked for the UN Humanitarian Air Service, had to be operated on, the WHO spokesperson said. He appeared to be recovering satisfactorily, the person added.

(Reuters)

At least 45,436 Palestinians have been killed, and 108,038 have been injured since 7 October last year - The Gaza Health Ministry revealed on Friday.

Ukraine, a global producer and exporter of grain and oilseeds, has sent its first batch of food aid to Syria, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday.

Zelenskyy said that 500 metric tons of wheat flour were already on their way to Syria as part of Ukraine's humanitarian "Grain from Ukraine" initiative in cooperation with the United Nations World Food Programme.

"The wheat flour is planned to be distributed to 33,250 families or 167,000 people, in the coming weeks," Zelenskiy said on X, adding: "Each package weighs 15 kilograms and can feed a family of five for one month."

After the ouster of Bashar al-Assad, a close Russian ally, Ukraine has said it wants to restore relations with Syria.

Kyiv traditionally exports wheat and corn to countries in the Middle East, but not to Syria.

During Assad's era, Syria imported food from Russia. But Russian wheat supplies to Syria have been suspended because of uncertainty, Russian and Syrian sources said earlier this month.

(Reuters)

The Houthis on Friday said they fired a missile at Israel's Ben Gurion airport after Israel's military reported a missile had been intercepted.

The new claim came a day after Israeli raids pounded Sanaa's international airport and other targets in rebel-held areas of Yemen.

A Houthi statement said they also launched drones at Tel Aviv and a ship in the Arabian Sea, stating that Israeli "aggression will only increase the determination and resolve of the great Yemeni people to continue supporting the Palestinian people".

Israel's military earlier Friday said, "One missile that was launched from Yemen was intercepted before crossing into Israeli territory."

There was no immediate comment on the other attacks claimed by the Houthis.

The Israeli military reported it conducted airstrikes on Friday targeting "infrastructure" on the Syrian-Lebanese border near the village of Janta, which it said was used to smuggle weapons to the armed group Hezbollah.

"Earlier today, the IAF (Israeli air force) struck infrastructure that was used to smuggle weapons via Syria to the Hezbollah terrorist organisation in Lebanon at the Janta crossing on the Syrian-Lebanese border," the military said in a statement.

It did not specify whether the strikes were on the Syrian or Lebanese side, but they came a day after Lebanon's army accused Israel of "violation of the ceasefire agreement by attacking Lebanese sovereignty and destroying southern towns and villages".

There is no official crossing point near Janta but the area is known for illegal crossings.

An Israeli hospital reported that a woman in her eighties was killed after being stabbed in the coastal city of Herzliya on Friday, while police stated that the suspected attacker had been arrested.

"She was brought to the hospital with multiple stab wounds while undergoing resuscitation efforts, but the hospital staff was forced to pronounce her death upon arrival," Tel Aviv Ichilov hospital said in a statement.

The incident took place in Herzliya's De Shalit Square, the police said.

"We provided initial treatment, stopped the bleeding and treated her with medication, and evacuated her in critical condition," medic Idan Shina from the national medical service Magen David Adom said in a statement, before the hospital announced her death.

In a separate statement, police said the suspected attacker, a 28-year-old "resident of the Palestinian Authority" in the occupied West Bank, had been arrested.

Israeli air strikes hit rebel-held Sanaa's international airport and other targets in Yemen on Thursday as the head of the UN's World Health Organization said he and his team prepared to fly out.

Yemen's civil aviation authority said the airport planned to reopen on Friday after the strikes that it said occurred while the UN aircraft "was getting ready for its scheduled flight".

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether they knew at the time that WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was there. Israel's attack came a day after the Iran-backed Houthi rebels claimed the firing of a missile and two drones at Israel.

Turkey aims to provide electricity to Syria and strengthen its power infrastructure. Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar was quoted on Friday as saying that Ankara may also work with Syria's new leadership on oil and natural gas.

Bayraktar, who met with Turkish media representatives, said a delegation he may chair was planning to travel to Syria on Saturday to discuss electricity transmission, infrastructure and other matters.

"We must very rapidly provide electricity to parts of Syria that do not have electricity, with imports in the initial phase. In the medium-term, we also plan to increase the set electricity power, the production capacity there," Hurriyet newspaper cited him as saying.

"There is a need for everything in Syria. We will work on the infrastructure master plan with the leaders there," he said, adding Turkey could also send electricity to Lebanon via Syria.

After backing the Syrian rebels who toppled President Bashar al-Assad this month after a 13-year civil war, Turkey has emerged as one of the main power brokers in its southern neighbour and has vowed to help rebuild the country.

(Reuters)

A Syria war monitor, on Thursday, said the country's new authorities had arrested a military justice official under the ousted government of president Bashar al-Assad who issued death sentences for people held in the notorious Saydnaya prison.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Mohammed Kanjo Hassan was arrested in the coastal Tartus province, a stronghold of Assad's clan, along with 20 members of his entourage.

Under the deposed government, Kanjo Hassan issued, according to the Observatory, "thousands" of sentences, including death sentences, for people held in Saydnaya.