For the first time in over a decade of conflict, farmers in Syria's rebel-held northwest are irrigating their crops more easily thanks to the rehabilitation of a vital reservoir, bringing life back to parched fields.
Water from the Bala reservoir is once again flowing to a fertile plain in the Idlib area, home to several million people, many of them displaced during the country's devastating civil war.
A seemingly ordinary villa in the heart of Tripoli holds a lifetime of works by the late Libyan artist Ali Gana, whose family has turned his house into a unique museum.
In the North African country still grappling with divisions and conflict after the fall of longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011, "art comes last", said Hadia Gana, the youngest of the artist's four children.
Yemen's Iran-backed Huthis threatened Friday to escalate attacks on Red Sea shipping after overnight strikes by the United States and Britain that the rebels said killed 16 people.
The toll announced by the Huthis, which AFP could not independently verify, would make the strikes some of the deadliest since the US and Britain launched their campaign in January against disruption of the vital trade route.
Oil giant Saudi Aramco said on Thursday it plans to sell 1.545 billion shares worth more than $10 billion in one of the biggest such offerings in recent years.
In a statement posted to the Saudi stock exchange, Aramco announced a "secondary public offering of 1.545 billion shares", with an expected price range between 26.70 and 29 Saudi riyals ($7 to $7.70).
The sale on the local bourse, which represents approximately 0.64 percent of the company's issued shares, will commence on Sunday, Aramco said.
A Madrid court on Thursday placed former Barcelona player Gerard Pique under official investigation as part of a probe into suspected corruption in a deal to take the Spanish Super Cup to Saudi Arabia.
Spanish football federation contracts signed since 2018 are being investigated, including one by disgraced former federation president Luis Rubiales to have the oil-rich Gulf state host the Spanish Super Cup.
The Super Cup contracts are worth 40 million euros a year ($43 million) with the deal brokered by Kosmos, a company owned by former Barcelona and Spain defender Pique.
Rainbows and yellow ribbons mingled at this year's Jerusalem Pride March Thursday, as marchers called for gay rights and the release of hostages held in Gaza in a less festive mood than usual.
At the head of the march, several thousands strong, hostage relatives and French ambassador to Israel Frederic Journes held a banner reading "Born to be free" in English, featuring the LGBTQ rainbow colours and a yellow ribbon representing support for hostage families.
"It's more sad than usual," said Shlomo Gedzel, a 23 year-old biology student at the Hebrew University.
The UN General Assembly drew criticism Thursday for its tribute to the late Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi who died in a helicopter crash, with Washington boycotting the gathering.
Following a minute's silence, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres offered his condolences to the families of the victims of the May 19 incident, as well as to the Iranian people.
"I wish to assure that the United Nations stands in solidarity with the Iranian people and in the quest for peace, development and fundamental freedoms," Guterres said.
Cyprus on Thursday said humanitarian aid shipped to war-torn Gaza was being kept afloat off the Palestinian territory's coast after a US-built pier was damaged by bad weather.
"No aid was sent today, but the one (shipment) that left two days ago is now being stored using a floating mechanism until the dock is fully repaired," said government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis.
The US military said on Tuesday that it had suspended aid deliveries via the pier after high seas and a North African weather system caused a section of the floating platform to break away.
The centrist party of Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz said Thursday it had submitted a bill to dissolve parliament and hold an early election.
"The head of the National Union Party, Pnina Tamano-Shata, has put forward a bill to dissolve the 25th Knesset. This follows the request of party leader Minister Benny Gantz to move forward in broad agreement to an election before October, a year since the massacre," the party said in a statement.
A rusty barbed wire fence towers above the students entering Urif high school in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where spiralling violence since October 7 has struck fear into Palestinians.
"We tell the students ... to come to school together and not on their own, because we do not know when their (settlers) attack will be," said Mazin Shehadeh, vice-principal for the high school located in a village south of the city of Nablus.
On the hill above the village sits the Israeli settlement of Yitzhar, from where Palestinians say settlers descend to attack them.
