The Israeli army launched a drone strike on the Gaza Strip on Saturday after violent protests in which three Palestinians were wounded by Israeli fire, sources on both sides said.

The early evening strike is one of a series that have come amid near-daily protests at the border by Palestinians after Israel closed the Erez crossing from Gaza.

A drone "struck a military post belonging to the Hamas terrorist organisation, adjacent to the area where a violent riot was taking place", the army said.

Four Roman tombs dating back 2,000 years have been discovered in the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian archaeologist said Saturday, bemoaning a lack of resources that has delayed excavations in the besieged territory.

"With the discovery of these four tombs, the total number of tombs in this Roman cemetery, dating from the period between the first century BC and the second century AD, now stands at 134 tombs," said archaeologist Fadel Al-Otol.

The discovery marks the first complete Roman necropolis, or cemetery, fully unearthed in Gaza, he told AFP.

Chinese President Xi Jinping opened the 19th Asian Games in a colourful ceremony in Hangzhou on Saturday, launching a two-week sporting extravaganza that boasts more athletes than the Olympics.

After being delayed by a year because of China's now-abandoned zero-Covid policy, more than 12,000 competitors from 45 nations and territories will battle it out in 40 sports.

In front of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and other visiting leaders, Xi officially opened the Games at the 80,000-capacity Hangzhou Olympic stadium, also known as "the Big Lotus".

Chinese President Xi Jinping will declare the Asian Games open at a glittering ceremony in Hangzhou on Saturday, kickstarting a sporting behemoth that boasts more athletes than the Olympics.

After being delayed by a year due to China's strict zero-Covid regime, more than 12,000 competitors from 45 nations across Asia and the Middle East are in the eastern city to compete in 40 sports.

Xi is scheduled to open proceedings officially in one of the country's most prosperous regions, in front of invited guests including Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The Israeli military said it hit three Hamas targets in Gaza Friday after new protests along the border sparked clashes in which health officials said 28 Palestinians were wounded.

There have been repeated clashes along the border fence since September 13, with Palestinians protesters throwing stones and petrol bombs at Israeli troops who have responded with tear gas and live bullets.

On September 15, Israel launched its first air strike on Gaza since early July, targeting the territory's Islamist rulers Hamas.

As much of the world's attention has been focused on the port city of Derna since last week's flooding in eastern Libya, other cities are mired in the resulting damage.

Ahmed Saleh, a 34-year-old civil engineer clad in a traditional white jalabiya, is still in shock at the scale of the destruction in his home city, Susa.

More than 10 days after the deadly storms lashed eastern Libya, he says they still have great difficulty accessing drinking water after a desalination plant was badly damaged.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday warned Iran at the United Nations of a "nuclear threat" in what his office quickly walked back as a slip of the tongue.

The hawkish prime minister said that alarm over Tehran's clerical leaders was driving Israel closer to the Arab world, with his government on the "cusp" of a historic breakthrough with Saudi Arabia.

Netanyahu, who has repeatedly used the UN stage to issue dark warnings about Tehran, briefly gave pause at the General Assembly when he appeared to threaten nuclear attack if Tehran pursues its own atomic bomb.

Iran says it has received thousands of Achaemenid-era clay tablets from the United States in the fifth such instalment, following a drawn-out legal effort to repatriate the antiquities.

"After the two-year follow-up of the government... the Achaemenid tablets confiscated by the American government were returned to the country," said a statement posted on Iran's presidency website late Thursday.

The 3,506 tablets were repatriated on the plane that also brought home the Iranian delegation from New York after it attended the United Nations General Assembly.

In the sandy courtyard of a school turned shelter in northern Sudan, two children idly pass a football back and forth. Around them, dozens of adults wait, trapped between a war and a border.

There is little else to do in the border town of Wadi Halfa, where a local support group says upwards of 20,000 displaced people live in limbo, unable to cross the northern frontier into Egypt and escape the five-month war between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

Chinese President Xi Jinping announced a "strategic partnership" with Syria on Friday during talks with President Bashar al-Assad, who is seeking financial support to help rebuild his devastated country.

The leaders met on the eve of the Asian Games opening ceremony, which Assad will attend as part of his first visit to China since 2004.

China is one of only a handful of countries outside the Middle East that Assad has visited since the 2011 start of a civil war that killed more than half a million people, displaced millions and battered Syria's infrastructure and industry.