A Saudi man who spent nearly seven years in an Israeli jail after he got lost in Egypt's Sinai desert has returned home, local daily al-Watan reported on Saturday.

Abdulrahman al-Atwi arrived in Riyadh on Thursday from the United States to where he was deported by Israel several months ago, the newspaper said, adding that it met him at his lawyer's residence in the Saudi capital.

Russia warned Saturday that a "tragedy" was looming in Syria's second city of Aleppo but said it was unrealistic to expect the government would stand by when armed rebels were occupying major cities.

"We are persuading the government that they need to make some first gestures," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told a news conference alongside his Japanese counterpart.

Israeli troops on Saturday arrested a member of the Islamic Jihad militant group at his home in the West Bank city of Nablus, his relatives said.

Relatives of Abdallah Harouf, 24, said that troops seized him at his home near the Old City during the early hours of Saturday.

Two Italian technicians, who worked as subcontractors in Syria for Italian energy group Ansaldo, were released late on Friday after going missing for a week, the official SANA news agency said.

"During operations to cleanse some (rebel) areas in the province of Damascus, Syrian troops managed to liberate the two Italian technicians, who were kidnapped by an armed terrorist group," SANA said.

Syrian rebels staved off a fightback by regime forces in Aleppo on Saturday amid growing concern about the risks of reprisals against civilians in the country's commercial capital.

After massing for two days, troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships moved on southwestern Aleppo where rebels concentrated their forces when they seized much of the northern city on July 20.

Turkey this week cranked up its already-heated rhetoric against Kurdish militants in northern Syria, saying it would not hesitate to go after PKK fighters, just as it has in northern Iraq.

Analysts warn such a move would be dangerous for Turkey and further complicate Syria's deadly conflict and the volatile regional situation.

The United States said it was "very concerned" about a Syrian offensive in Aleppo, Syria, but rejected comparisons to Libya where NATO-led forces intervened last year to protect civilians.

"We are very concerned about the situation in Aleppo," White House spokesman Jay Carney said, condemning Syrian President Bashar Assad's "heinous, reprehensible" assault on Syrian civilians.

Tunisian Finance Minister Houcine Dimassi has resigned following a disagreement with the policies of the government led by Islamist Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali, an official said on Friday.

"I can confirm the resignation, which has been accepted," Ridha Kazdaghli, an aide to Jebali, told Agence France Presse.

Poland said it evacuated its embassy staff from Damascus Friday, cutting short its diplomatic work on behalf of the United States which pulled out its own diplomats in February.

Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski "decided to indefinitely close the Polish Republic's embassy in Damascus including the United States section as of July 27," his ministry said in a statement.

Syrian rebels on Friday captured 150 regime troops and militia members in the northern city of Aleppo and the northwestern province of Idlib, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

It reported rebels as saying they had captured 100 regime soldiers and militia members in Aleppo and another 50 in Idlib, citing videos distributed by Syrian activists.