Every morning, his skin bronzed by the sun, pensioner Metin Cakmakci rushes to grab a deckchair under a parasol on his local beach on the Asian side of Istanbul.

"A sea like this for a gigantic city such as Istanbul -- it's not bad," the 74-year-old smiles, pointing to the crystal-clear water facing the Princes' Islands on the Sea of Marmara.

Istanbul, a bustling megalopolis of 16 million people between two continents and two seas, does not immediately bring to mind images of a beach resort.

Ways to halt the war in Ukraine and the possible launch of a new conflict in Syria are expected to dominate talks on Friday between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The Turkish leader was riding high from the diplomatic success of helping orchestrate the resumption of Ukrainian grain shipments across the Black Sea when he took most of his top ministers to Sochi for his second talks with Putin in 17 days.

Iraqi Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr is calling for elections, months after polls failed to lead to an agreement on a new government, prime minister and president.

As Sadr's supporters are occupying parliament for a sixth day, is the powerful cleric bluffing? Or could his call see a negotiated end to months of political deadlock in the oil-rich but impoverished country?

- Why urge an early vote?

In multi-confessional and multi-ethnic Iraq, government formation has involved complex negotiations since a 2003 US-led invasion toppled dictator Saddam Hussein.

Gaza's only power station is at risk of imminent shutdown due to a lack of fuel, its manager warned Thursday as Israel's complete closure on the territory reached a third day.

Israel shut the goods and people crossings along its frontier with Gaza on Tuesday, citing fears of reprisals following the arrest of two senior Palestinian Islamic Jihad members in the occupied West Bank.

The military has also imposed restrictions of movement on Israeli communities adjacent to the Gaza Strip.

Several more grain silos damaged by the 2020 Beirut port explosion collapsed Thursday, as hundreds marched toward them to mark the second anniversary of the disaster.

AFP correspondents saw parts of the gutted structure fall down while local media said at least four towers had collapsed, only days after a similar incident.

Experts had been warning for days that the silos could collapse imminently after recording unprecedented inclination rates.

Lama Hashem, a 30-year-old who took part in Thursday's protest march said the incident reignited her blast trauma.

Negotiators kicked off a fresh round of talks over Iran's nuclear programme in Vienna on Thursday, seeking to salvage the agreement on Tehran's atomic ambitions.

Officials from world powers and Iran were meeting in the Austrian capital for the first time since March, when negotiations, which began in 2021 to reintegrate the United States into the agreement, stalled.

A senior EU official said progress was being made on some of the remaining obstacles, including guarantees that the United States would not scupper the deal by going back on its word in the future.

From the ancient alleys of Jerusalem's Old City to kitchens around the world, Palestinians are stirring new trends in cooking while abiding by traditions.

The trend has whipped up a growing appetite for specialised books and food tours.

"It's changing for the better, I think. Many Palestinians are keen on promoting their foods," said Nassar Odeh, as oven aromas wafted over a Jerusalem street.

The Palestinian entrepreneur has spent the past few months watching gourmands drift in and out of his new eatery, Taboon, named after the traditional clay oven.

Lebanon marked two years Thursday since a massive explosion ripped through Beirut -- a grim anniversary marked by angry protests and the dramatic collapse of blast-damaged grain silos in a cloud of dust.

The 2020 disaster, one of history's biggest non-nuclear explosions, killed more than 200 people and decimated vast areas of the capital after a stockpile of haphazardly stored ammonium nitrate caught fire.

Powerful Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr, whose bloc won the most seats in Iraq's elections last year, demanded Wednesday that parliament be dissolved and new national polls be called.

Nearly 10 months on from the last elections, the country still has no government, new prime minister or new president, due to repeated squabbles between factions over forming a coalition.

In the latest political turmoil to strike the oil-rich but war-scarred nation, Sadr called for a "revolutionary and peaceful process, then early democratic elections after a dissolution of parliament".

The United States and the European Union's Iran nuclear envoys on Wednesday said they were travelling to Vienna for talks with Tehran's delegation as they seek to salvage the agreement on its atomic ambitions.

The US State Department's point man on negotiations with Iran, Rob Malley, announced his trip to Austria on Twitter after talks over the Islamic republic's nuclear programme have stalled for months.

"Our expectations are in check, but the United States welcomes EU efforts and is prepared for a good faith attempt to reach a deal," Malley said.