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.

Iran on Thursday began the formal registration of presidential candidates ahead of a snap vote next month to replace the late Ebrahim Raisi who died in a helicopter crash.

"Candidate registration for the 14th presidential elections began at 8 am (0430 GMT)... at the interior ministry," the official IRNA news agency said.

Presidential hopefuls will have five days to register, IRNA added.

The elections were originally slated for 2025 but were brought forward following Raisi's unexpected death on May 19.

Intense shelling and gunfire rocked Rafah in southern Gaza on Thursday, after Israel declared it had seized a strategic corridor along the Palestinian territory's border with Egypt.

Israel launched its military incursion into Rafah in early May despite international objections over the safety of civilians sheltering in the city.

A strike that sparked a fire and killed dozens in a displacement camp at the weekend drew a wave of fresh condemnation.

At a Tehran cafe, Hamid waves his mobile around hoping to latch onto a faint signal and thus bypass Iran's stringent ban on the latest models of iPhone.

He bought his new device abroad shortly after the Islamic republic banned 14 and 15 series iPhones in February 2023, hoping that the restrictions would eventually ease.

But they never did.

"I had network coverage for just a month but then it went away," the 32-year-old told AFP, repeatedly pressing his phone's power button to try to regain connectivity.

Chinese President Xi Jinping called on Thursday for a peace conference to end the war between Israel and Hamas, as he addressed Arab leaders at a forum aimed at bolstering ties with the region.

Xi is this week hosting Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, Emirati President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and several other Arab leaders.

Itself an oil producer, China has also long imported crude from the Middle East, where it has sought to expand its influence in recent years.

An AI-generated image bearing the words "All eyes on Rafah" has been shared by more than 44 million Instagram accounts since Monday after a deadly Israeli strike at a camp for displaced Palestinians in the Gazan city.

The image depicts densely packed rows of tents stretching endlessly across a desert landscape overshadowed by mountains, alluding to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who fled there during Israel's military campaign against Hamas.

Syria's defence ministry said an Israeli air strike Wednesday killed a girl and wounded 10 civilians on the coast, as a war monitor reported another raid killed five pro-Hezbollah fighters.

"The Israeli enemy launched an air attack from the direction of Lebanon, targeting a central site and a residential building in Baniyas city in the coastal region, killing a girl and wounding 10 civilians," a ministry statement said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor also reported the girl's death and put the civilian wounded toll at 20.

The move by Spain, Ireland and Norway to recognise the State of Palestine will give a major boost to the cause, the Palestinian Authority's health minister said Wednesday, urging other European countries to follow suit.

Maged Abu Ramadan thanked the three countries, their people and their governments for their "courageous decision", saying it would have a "great political, positive input on the case of Palestine, wherever it will be discussed".

Brazil has recalled its ambassador to Israel, a diplomatic source told AFP Wednesday, ratcheting up tensions between the two countries over Israel's war in Gaza.

The nearly eight-month-old conflict has soured Israel's diplomatic ties with several nations, including Brazil, whose President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in February accused the country's government of genocide.

Israel reacted furiously, declaring the Brazilian leader persona non grata.

Kuwait said Wednesday its refining capacity had reached a record 1.8 million barrels per day as it inaugurated one of the region's biggest refineries which started operating at full capacity in recent months.

Made up of three component units, the huge Al-Zour refinery is one of the biggest in the Middle East. It was officially inaugurated on Wednesday, months after its output reached full capacity of 615,000 bpd.

"We have succeeded in reaching an unprecedented refining capacity of 1.83 million bpd both domestically and abroad," Oil Minister Emad Mohammed al-Atiqi said.