Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday criticized Washington for its response to his claims of Israel's involvement in the Egypt crisis.

The Turkish leader on Tuesday accused the Jewish state of being behind the military-backed ouster of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi last month.

Egypt partially reopened the Rafah crossing with Gaza on Saturday, a Hamas official said, more than a week after it closed the strip's only land passage that bypasses Israel.

Maher Abu Sabha, director general of border crossing for Gaza's Islamist Hamas government, said the terminal opened in the morning and would operate every day for four hours "for humanitarian cases and holders of foreign passports".

Maronite patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, who is known for his strong views against radical Islamism, said the situation in Egypt and Syria showed there was a plan by outside powers "to destroy the Arab world".

"There is a plan to destroy the Arab world for political and economic interests and boost inter-confessional conflict between Sunnis and Shiites," al-Rahi told Vatican radio.

U.S. President Barack Obama appeared to suggest in an interview aired Friday that pulling U.S. aid from Egypt would not reverse the behavior of its ruling generals after a coup.

Obama's administration is currently reviewing the status of U.S. assistance to Cairo following the ouster of ex-president Mohammed Morsi and a subsequent crackdown on Islamists.

Several thousand demonstrators joined at least three marches in different parts of the Egyptian capital on Friday to protest the ouster of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi, Agence France Presse correspondents said.

Loyalists of the deposed president had called for 28 marches throughout Cairo, though many appeared sparsely attended.

Tunisia's opposition Friday rejected the ruling Islamists' proposals for ending a month-long political crisis, ahead of anti-government protests, saying their offer to enter talks on a technocrat administration was insufficient.

"All negotiations without the (immediate) dissolution of the government are a waste of time," said Taieb Baccouche, a representative of the National Salvation Front (NSF), the broad coalition of opposition parties.

A boat carrying 140 asylum seekers who told police they were from Syria and Egypt landed in Italy on Friday, television images showed and officials said.

The group included 29 women and 31 minors and their rickety wooden boat was intercepted by a border guard vessel off the coast of Syracuse in Sicily.

The U.S. on Thursday sidestepped questions about former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak's release, saying it was a matter for Cairo to decide, but called for his ousted successor Mohammed Morsi to be freed.

"With respect to the Mubarak trial and decisions made, this is an internal Egyptian legal matter," said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.

Egypt is set to reopen the Rafah crossing, a Hamas official said on Thursday, a week after Cairo closed down the Gaza Strip's only land passage that bypasses Israel.

"The Rafah crossing will reopen this Saturday for four hours daily, for humanitarian cases and Palestinians with foreign nationalities," Maher Abu Sabha, director general of border crossing for the Islamist Hamas government, said in a statement.

Egypt's bloody crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood has been a gift to al-Qaida that will help it attract fresh followers and open a new front in the Middle East, experts say.

The repression of the Muslim Brotherhood and the ouster of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi could see a new generation of radicals joining the movement founded by Osama bin Laden, they say.