A 16-year-old Palestinian rammed a vehicle into an Israeli checkpoint in the West Bank overnight, wounding a security guard before being shot and "neutralized" at the scene, the Israeli Defense Ministry said Monday.

Israeli media reported that the alleged attacker was killed, while a ministry official declined to comment further. Defense Minister Benny Gantz praised the security forces' response and wished a speedy recovery to the guard, who has been hospitalized.

The national security adviser of the United Arab Emirates met Monday with Iran's hard-line president in Tehran, a major visit for the Gulf Arab federation that has long viewed the Islamic Republic as its main regional threat.

The visit by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan comes as the Emirates and Saudi Arabia are both negotiating with Iran amid efforts in Vienna to save Tehran's tattered nuclear deal with world powers.

Saudi Arabia's crown prince was heading Monday to Oman, the first stop of a tour of Gulf Arab states that will see him meet neighboring rulers and allies as the kingdom closely watches negotiations in Europe to revive Iran's nuclear deal with world powers.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's visit coincides with a flurry of other diplomatic meetings in the region, including Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's visit to ally Qatar and a visit by a high-ranking security official from the United Arab Emirates to Iran. Confirmed by Saudi and Omani media, the tour also comes ahead of an upcoming annual six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council meeting of rulers this month.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has voiced hope for a quick approval of the country's Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine by the World Health Organization, saying the move is essential to expand its global supplies.

Speaking during a video call with Francesco Rocca, president of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Putin said receiving the WHO's vetting is necessary to spread the Russian vaccine more broadly around the world, including free supplies.

Israeli authorities have freed a prominent Palestinian prisoner, two weeks after striking a release deal that ended his marathon 131-day hunger strike, said a prisoner rights group.

Kayed Fasfous, 32, had remained in an Israeli hospital since ending his strike on Nov. 23. He was the symbolic figurehead of six hunger strikers protesting Israel's controversial policy of "administrative detention," which allows suspects to be held indefinitely without charge.

Pope Francis returned Sunday to the Greek island of Lesbos to offer comfort to migrants at a refugee camp and blast what he said was the indifference and self-interest shown by Europe "that condemns to death those on the fringes."

"Please, let us stop this shipwreck of civilization!" Francis said at the Mavrovouni camp, a cluster of white U.N. containers on the edge of the sea lined by barbed wire fencing and draped with laundry hanging from lines.

Presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin will speak in a video call Tuesday, the White House and Kremlin said, as tensions between the United States and Russia escalate over a Russian troop buildup on the Ukrainian border that's seen as a sign of a potential invasion.

Biden will press U.S. concerns about Russian military activities on the border and "reaffirm the United States' support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Saturday, confirming the planned call after first word came from Moscow.

A Saudi-led coalition fighting Iran-backed rebels in Yemen accelerated airstrikes on the capital and elsewhere in the conflict-stricken country in recent weeks, as government forces advanced in the west coast and the key province of Marib, officials said Sunday.

The coalition said it hit military facilities in rebel-held Sanaa and launched airstrikes against Houthi front lines in the strategic Marib and Hodeida provinces.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Sunday urged world powers to take a hard line against Iran in negotiations aimed at reviving an international nuclear deal, as his top defense and intelligence officials headed to Washington to discuss the flailing talks.

Israel has been watching with concern as world powers sit down with Iran in Vienna in hopes of restoring the tattered 2015 deal. Iran last week struck its own hard line as talks resumed in Vienna, suggesting everything discussed in previous rounds of diplomacy could be renegotiated. Continued Iranian advances in its atomic program have further raised the stakes in talks that are crucial to cooling years of tensions in the wider Mideast.

France's president and Saudi Arabia's crown prince held a joint phone call with Lebanon's prime minister during Emmanuel Macron's visit to the kingdom on Saturday, in a significant gesture amid an unprecedented crisis between Lebanon and Saudi Arabia.

During the calls with Prime Minister Najib Miqati, Macron said France and Saudi Arabia expressed their commitment to Lebanon, despite Saudi Arabia's uneasiness with Iran's sway over the small Mediterranean country.