In a packed cafe in Cairo, all eyes were glued to a flickering flat-screen TV, waiting for Omar Marmoush, now donning Manchester City's sky-blue jersey, to step onto the pitch.

In the 84th minute, the Egyptian forward finally jogged to the sideline, ready to make his UEFA Champions League debut against Real Madrid.

The cafe erupted with cheers and hands banging on tables, and even longtime Madrid fans joined in to celebrate one of their own.

The Spanish side ended up winning 3-2, but at the Cairo cafe, the result did not diminish the love for Marmoush.

Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto and Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan held talks Wednesday, signing a series of agreements to boost trade and defence ties between the Muslim-majority nations, including a joint venture to build drones.

The Turkish leader was visiting Southeast Asia's largest economy after travelling to Malaysia and before heading to Pakistan on a four-day tour of key allies in the Islamic world.

As excitement swept through the Syrian community after Bashar al-Assad's overthrow, businesses in Turkey that rely on them for labour began quickly crunching the numbers.

"The Syrians have made a big contribution to the textile sector here. If they leave, there will be a serious labour problem," said Ali Gozcu, reflecting the widespread anxiety gripping Turkey's textile industry.

Gozcu runs ALG Tekstil, a clothing firm in Gaziantep, a southeastern Turkish city that is home to half a million Syrians.

Expat "mumfluencers" are taking to TikTok to sing the praises of life in Saudi Arabia and to extol the virtues of its new NEOM megacity, filming their idyllic lives spent picnicking by turquoise waters and shopping in gleaming malls.

"If you have children, Saudi Arabia is the best place," Aida McPherson, an Azerbaijani born in London, told her almost 60,000 followers as she filmed her daughter in traditional Saudi dress on a shopping trip.

When President Donald Trump froze nearly all US foreign aid, Cambodia was forced to suspend workers removing dangerous mines from the country -- until China stepped in with the necessary funding.

In the Cook Islands, traditionally bound to New Zealand and friendly with the United States, the prime minister has announced plans to head to Beijing to sign a cooperation deal.

Successive US administrations have vowed to wage a global competition with China, described as the only potential rival for global leadership.

A suspension of US foreign aid and possible dismantling of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) will have a major impact on some of the world's poorest countries, the Washington-based Center for Global Development (CGD) warned Tuesday.

For more than 20 economies, a year-long pause on US aid could mean a loss of over one percent of their gross national income, the CGD said in a blog post.

And eight economies including South Sudan, Somalia and Afghanistan could face a hit of three percent or more, the group added.

More than $53 billion will be required to rebuild Gaza and end the "humanitarian catastrophe" that has gripped the war-ravaged territory, including $20 billion in the first three years alone, the United Nations said Tuesday.

The global body said in a report that a "political and security framework" must also be put in place so that recovery and rebuilding can begin, and a groundwork can be laid for a political process to quickly end the Israeli occupation "and establish a viable two-State solution."

In a centuries-old monastery on a rocky hill north of Damascus, friends of missing Italian priest Paolo Dall'Oglio carry on his legacy, hopeful Bashar al-Assad's ouster might help reveal the Jesuit's fate.

"We want to know if Father Paolo is alive or dead, who imprisoned him, and what was his fate," said Father Jihad Youssef who heads Deir Mar Musa al-Habashi, about 100 kilometres (62 miles) north of Damascus.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday doubled down on his idea of exiling Palestinians and placing a rebuilt Gaza under "US authority" but faced pushback from visiting Jordanian King Abdullah II.

"I reiterated Jordan’s steadfast position against the displacement of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. This is the unified Arab position. Rebuilding Gaza without displacing the Palestinians and addressing the dire humanitarian situation should be the priority for all," Abdullah said on social media after the talks.

A Swedish court on Tuesday sentenced a 52-year-old woman to 12 years in prison on genocide charges, in the country's first court case over crimes by the Islamic State group against the Yazidi minority.

Accused of keeping Yazidi women and children as slaves at her home in Syria in 2015, Lina Ishaq was convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, the Stockholm district court said in a statement.