An Israeli air strike on Gaza City killed one person and wounded another on Tuesday, Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry said.

"A man in his 20s was martyred and another injured in an Israeli air strike... in Shati refugee camp in western Gaza City," health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra told Agence France Presse.

Activists said Tuesday that at least 15 opposition fighters have been killed in a battle with Syrian government troops for a military helicopter base in the country's north.

The Britain-based Observatory for Human Rights said fighting between rebels and President Bashar Assad's troops is raging around the Mannagh base in the northern province of Aleppo.

Israel on Tuesday welcomed a shift in the terms of the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative following top-level talks in Washington, with the proposal now endorsing the idea of mutually-agreed land swaps with the Palestinians.

The principle of land swaps has been affirmed by Israel and the Palestinians in previous rounds of talks but has never formed part of the Saudi initiative.

Saudi police arrested an activist wanted on security-related charges after a gunfight in the kingdom's Eastern province, scene to sporadic protests since early 2011, the interior ministry said.

Abdullah al-Asreeh, one of 23 activists on a wanted list for allegedly fomenting trouble in the eastern region, was arrested along with an unarmed man who faces charges of selling drugs and alcohol, the ministry said late Monday.

Kuwait has deported 213 foreigners over the past few days for committing "grave" traffic offenses as part of a drive to reduce accidents, a senior interior ministry official said in comments published on Tuesday.

"We have deported 213 expatriates during the past few days for violating traffic rules and committing grave offenses," interior ministry assistant undersecretary for traffic affairs Major General Abdulfattah al-Ali told al-Anbaa newspaper.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry pushed Bahrain Monday to step up reforms and boost human rights as he met his counterpart from the Gulf kingdom shaken by two years of Shiite-led protests.

The top U.S. diplomat spoke with Bahraini Foreign Minister Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmed al-Khalifa behind closed doors, with neither making a public statement after the talks.

U.S. President Barack Obama stepped up pressure on Russia over Syria on Monday, telling his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin of his concern about the reported use of chemical weapons by the Damascus regime.

Obama also thanked Putin in the telephone call for his help after the Boston marathon bombings, and expressed condolences over a fire that killed 36 patients in a Russian psychiatric facility on Friday, the White House said.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Monday he will host talks with Arab League officials as part of a painstaking process aimed at revitalizing the Middle East peace process.

Kerry has already devoted time and energy to trying to find a way to bring all sides back to the negotiating table since taking office on February 1.

Israeli president and Nobel peace laureate Shimon Peres left for Rome on Monday for talks with Pope Francis and the new Italian government, his office said.

"I intend to personally invite Pope Francis for an official state visit to Israel and to strengthen the good relations that already exist between Israel and the Vatican," a statement quoted Peres as saying before his departure.

An Egyptian court acquitted Monday a Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya party leader who had been sentenced to death in absentia after a foiled bid in 1995 to assassinate ex-president Hosni Mubarak, a judicial source said.

Mustafa Hamza was a military commander of the fundamentalist group -- an organization outlawed under Mubarak -- which had been implicated in deadly attacks in the 1990s alongside another jihadist group, notably the Luxor massacre which killed about 70 people, mainly tourists, in 1997.