Yemen's Iran-backed Huthi rebels claimed on Monday to have twice attacked an American aircraft carrier group within 24 hours, calling it retaliation for deadly US strikes.

The Huthis initially said they launched 18 missiles and a drone at the "aircraft carrier USS Harry Truman and its accompanying warships" in the Red Sea, before hours later claiming to have fired a second round.

There was no immediate comment from the United States about the Huthis' claimed attacks.

Yemenis on Sunday recounted their panic and terror as the first US attacks under President Donald Trump struck rebel-held areas, killing dozens and wounding more than 100.

A "horrific explosion" rocked the capital, Sanaa, late on Saturday during suhoor, the night-time meal during the holy month of Ramadan, one resident said.

"The house shook, the windows shattered, and my family and I were terrified," father-of-two Ahmed, who did not want to give his full name, told AFP.

A massive explosion believed to have been triggered by a scrap dealer handling an old bomb killed at least 16 people in Syria, civil defence officials said Sunday.

The blast on Saturday in the Mediterranean city of Latakia demolished a four-storey building, ripping down slabs of concrete and crushing residents underneath chunks of their flattened homes.

Rescue officials pulled out the bodies through the night -- including five children -- as they searched for survivors.

Beneath the broken earth of the besieged Sudanese city of El-Fasher in the western region of Darfur, Nafisa Malik clutches her five children close.

As shells rain down, the 45-year-old mother tries to shield them in a cramped hole barely big enough to crouch in.

"Time slows down here," Malik said, from her home near El-Fasher's Hajer Gadou market.

"We sit in the darkness, listening, trying to guess when it's over," she told AFP by phone.

The first US strikes against Yemen's Huthis since Donald Trump took office killed 31 people, the rebels said Sunday, with the US president warning "hell will rain down upon" the Iran-backed group if it did not stop attacking shipping.

The Huthis, who have attacked Israel and Red Sea shipping throughout the Gaza war, said children were among those killed.

An AFP photographer in the rebel-held capital Sanaa heard explosions and saw plumes of smoke rising.

Israel said its negotiating team was discussing the hostage issue with Egyptian mediators Sunday, as deep divisions persist between Israel and Hamas over the terms of a fragile Gaza ceasefire.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, sought to dismiss the head of internal security agency Shin Bet, amid a public spat over proposed reforms to the agency following Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

A blast in the Syrian coastal city of Latakia killed at least 10 people on Saturday, state media reported, adding that it was triggered by a scrap dealer mishandling unexploded ordnance.

SANA news agency earlier reported that "the death toll from the explosion at a hardware store" in Latakia's southern neighbourhood of Al-Rimal had been eight.

The news agency said three children and a woman were among the victims of the blast at the store inside a four-storey building.

"Fourteen civilians were also injured, including four children," SANA said.

Syrians gathered on Saturday to commemorate the 14th anniversary of their uprising with a public demonstration in Damascus for the first time since president Bashar al-Assad was toppled.

The rally in Damascus's Umayyad Square was the first in the capital after years of repression under Assad, during which the square was the sole preserve of the ousted president's supporters.

Activists called on people to hold similar demonstrations in the major cities of Homs, Idlib and Hama under the slogan "Syria is victorious".

Syria's new temporary constitution concentrates power in interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa's hands and fails to include enough protections for minorities, experts warn.

The declaration, signed into law on Thursday, establishes a five-year transitional period and follows the toppling of Bashar al-Assad's repressive government by Islamist-led rebels after nearly 14 years of civil war.

Syria's interim foreign minister said in Baghdad on Friday his government was ready to "reinforce cooperation" with Iraq in the fight against remnants of the Islamic State group.

Asaad al-Shaibani's visit to Syria's neighbour coincided with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani announcing that security forces had killed a senior IS leader.

It was also Shaibani's first visit to Iraq since his Islamist alliance toppled Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad in December.