A dozen Palestinian returnees were allowed into Gaza from Egypt late Monday after the long-awaited reopening of the Rafah border crossing was marred by delays. Their arrival came hours after a small group of medical evacuees was ferried from the territory into Egypt.

The reopening of the crossing marked a key step in the Israel-Hamas ceasefire but mostly a symbolic one, with few people allowed to travel and no goods allowed to pass through. The limitations were apparent Monday as crossings fell well short of the 50 people officials had said would be allowed to move in each direction.

A meeting between the United States and Iran is likely to take place in Turkey on February 6, an Arab official told AFP on Tuesday, after Tehran called for the restart of nuclear talks and Washington warned of consequences if a deal was not reached.

"A meeting between U.S. negotiators and senior Iranian officials was likely to take place on Friday in Turkey," the official said on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive talks.

Northeast Syria's Hasakeh was under a curfew on Monday as government forces were expected to enter parts of the city under an integration deal with the Kurds.

Damascus and Kurdish forces reached a comprehensive agreement on Friday to gradually integrate the Kurds' military and civilian institutions into the state, after the minority ceded territory to advancing government forces in recent weeks.

Iraq's judiciary announced on Monday it has begun its investigations into more than 1,300 Islamic State group detainees who were transferred from Syria as part of a US operation.

"Investigation proceedings have started with 1,387 members of the Daesh terrorist organization who were recently transferred from the Syrian territory," the judiciary's media office said in a statement, using the Arabic acronym for IS.

Iran said Monday it expected a framework for negotiations with the United States would be ready in the coming days, as President Donald Trump threatens military action against Tehran.

"Countries of the region are acting as mediators in the exchange of messages," foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said, without giving details on the content of any prospective negotiations.

Iran said Monday it had summoned all of the European Union ambassadors in the Islamic Republic to protest the bloc's listing of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard as a terror group.

The move comes as Iran faces the threat of U.S. military action in response to the killing of peaceful demonstrators and over possible mass executions. The American military has moved the USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers into the Mideast. It remains unclear whether President Donald Trump will decide to use force, though regional countries have engaged in diplomacy in an effort to halt a new Mideast war breaking out.

Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt reopened on Monday for limited traffic, a key step as the Israeli-Hamas ceasefire moves ahead, according to Egyptian and Israeli security officials.

An Egyptian official said 50 Palestinians would cross in each direction in the first day of the crossing's operation. The official, involved in talks related the implementation of the ceasefire deal, spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss the issue.

U.S. President Donald Trump has said he was hopeful of agreeing a deal with Iran after the country's supreme leader warned that any U.S. attack on the Islamic republic would trigger a regional war.

Following the Iranian authorities' deadly response to anti-government protests that peaked last month, Trump has threatened military action and ordered the dispatch of an aircraft carrier group to the Middle East.

Syria's interior ministry said Sunday that its forces had dismantled a cell that was responsible for recent attacks targeting Damascus' Mazzeh district, saying the weapons came from Lebanon's Hezbollah.

Iran's supreme leader on Sunday likened recent anti-government protests to a "coup", warning that any U.S. attack on the Islamic republic following Washington's military deployments in the Middle East would trigger a regional war.