Caroline Wozniacki said Wednesday that Saudi Arabia will inevitably host more tennis tournaments but believes there is a chance to push for positive change after Rafael Nadal became an ambassador for the country.

The comments from the Grand Slam winner came after world number one Iga Swiatek said the issue was not "black and white".

The powerbrokers of the women's game are mulling whether to take the season-ending WTA Finals to the Gulf state.

Deliveries of medicine for Israeli hostages and Palestinian civilians were expected to start arriving in Gaza on Wednesday under a deal mediated by Qatar and France, after a night of deadly bombardments in the territory's south.

Militants took around 250 hostages during the bloody October 7 attacks that touched off the war, and around 132 are still in Gaza, including at least 27 believed to have been killed.

Sudan's devastating nine-month war between two rival generals is spreading to a UNESCO World Heritage Site, an NGO reported late Tuesday, sounding the alarm for the remains of the ancient Kingdom of Kush.

The Regional Network for Cultural Rights said it "strongly condemns the incursion by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF)", the paramilitary forces of general Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, "on the sites of Naqa and Musawwarat es-Sufra".

RSF forces have been fighting against troops loyal to Sudanese army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan since April last year.

Roberto Mancini's Saudi Arabia fought back to defeat Oman 2-1 in the dying seconds at the Asian Cup on Tuesday, but only after some VAR confusion.

Also in Group F, Thailand beat Kyrgyzstan 2-0 with Supachai Chaided scoring both goals.

The ambitious Saudis beat eventual champions Argentina in the group phase of the 2022 World Cup and returned to Qatar as one of the favourites for the regional tournament.

Karim Benzema on Tuesday filed a complaint for defamation against French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, who last year said the former Real Madrid star had "notorious" links with the Muslim Brotherhood.

Darmanin, a tough-talking right-winger with designs on the French presidency, criticised Benzema after the former France striker and 2022 Ballon d'Or winner posted on X (formerly Twitter) in mid-October in support of the inhabitants of Gaza, who, he claimed, were victims of "unjust bombardments" carried out by Israel in retaliation for the bloody Hamas attack of October 7.

UK police said Tuesday that specialist officers will assess whether to open a war crimes probe into Israel's war with Hamas, following a referral from an advocacy group for Palestinians.

London's Metropolitan Police said its small war crimes team, which is hosted within its counter terrorism command, would determine if any further action or formal investigation will be launched.

The Met, the UK's biggest and best-resourced police force, confirmed it had received a "referral" last Friday "relating to allegations linked to the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict".

Al Jazeera's Gaza bureau chief Wael al-Dahdouh left the Palestinian territory Tuesday, he told AFP, after Israeli strikes killed his wife, multiple children and a colleague.

Scenes of Dahdouh mourning his family and fleeing on foot from Gaza City have been broadcast globally over the weeks since war erupted between Hamas militants and Israel on October 7.

Speaking to an AFP journalist in southern Gaza, the 53-year-old said he had crossed the Rafah border post with Egypt.

European countries have promised only low key military support to counter Huthi rebel attacks on Red Sea shipping, as they balance geopolitical and domestic concerns with economic fears.

US and British forces have bombed the Yemeni rebels since Friday in response to mounting Huthi missile attacks on vessels in the vital shipping lanes since the Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel.

But many EU capitals have been leery of committing their forces, although the bloc's foreign ministers will discuss the crisis in Brussels on January 22.

Israel launched its most intense attacks on a single location in Lebanon's south Tuesday, targeting a border valley with air strikes and artillery, a local official and a security source told AFP.

Israel's army said it had conducted "aerial and artillery strikes" on Hezbollah targets "within a short amount of time" Tuesday in the Sluki valley area.

"Israeli forces have launched more than 14 air strikes on the Sluki valley," a security source with knowledge of operations on the ground in south Lebanon told AFP.

British oil giant Shell has paused transit through the key Red Sea shipping route indefinitely, over fears of escalating tensions involving Yemen's Huthi rebels, according to a media report Tuesday.

The worries of escalation grew after United States and United Kingdom strikes on scores of sites in rebel-held Yemen Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported, in retaliation over Huthi attacks in the Red Sea which have disrupted shipping.