Thousands of Moroccan fans poured into Doha's oldest market on Thursday to celebrate their country's success in becoming the only Arab nation to reach the World Cup second round.

Crowds gathered around a giant golden thumb sculpture in Souq Waqif market that has become a magnet for fans of winning teams to show national pride.

Argentinian, Tunisian and Saudi fans have also jammed the narrow alleys around the sculpture by French artist Cesar Baldaccini on earlier nights to blow horns, bang drums and make noise.

Ecstatic Moroccans celebrated on Thursday after their team qualified for the knockout stages of the World Cup for the first time since 1986.

"We've waited 36 years," one fan cried after the Atlas Lions beat Canada 2-1 to storm into the round of 16 as winners of their group.

In 1986, the football-obsessed North African nation became the first African or Arab country ever to reach the knockout stages, before many of the current players were born.

Ecstatic Moroccans celebrated on Thursday after their team qualified for the knockout stages of the World Cup for the first time since 1986.

"We've waited 36 years," one fan cried after the Atlas Lions beat Canada 2-1 to storm into the round of 16 as winners of their group.

In 1986, the football-obsessed North African nation became the first African or Arab country ever to reach the knockout stages, before many of the current players were born.

The United Nations said Thursday it discovered a "man-made cavity" under one of its schools in Gaza, the Palestinian territory controlled by Hamas, which boasts a network of tunnels, some of them used in past wars against Israel.

"The agency protested strongly to the relevant authorities in Gaza to express outrage and condemnation of the presence of such a structure underneath one of its installations," the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said in a statement.

Iran's president paid a visit Thursday to Kurdistan province, the cradle of protests over Mahsa Amini's death, and urged people to thwart the "enemy" which his government accuses of stoking the unrest.

The Islamic republic has been gripped by protests that erupted when Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin, died in custody on September 16 after her arrest for an alleged breach of the country's dress code for women.

"Be Afraid" is the cry for the 2023 Dakar Rally, the fourth to be held in Saudi Arabia, as organisers promised Thursday it would be the most challenging with a lot of sand dune racing.

Fifteen days of racing comprises a prologue and 14 stages, including a four-day excursion into the as yet unexplored desert of the vast Rub' al-Khali, or Empty Quarter, in the southern part of the Arabian Peninsula.

"This gigantic zone in which sand is king, especially in its most majestic form: dunes," said race director David Castera.

Israeli forces shot dead two Palestinian militants on Thursday during an arrest raid that sparked gun battles in a West Bank stronghold of hardline factions, said Palestinian officials and Israel's army.

Muhammad Ayman al-Saadi, 26, and Naim Jamal Zubaidi, 27, were "killed by the Israeli occupation bullets at dawn today during its aggression on Jenin camp," a Palestinian health ministry statement said.

Israel's army and Prime Minister Yair Lapid identified both Saadi and Zubaidi as top militants and confirmed their deaths in the operation, Israel's latest in the West Bank.

Two months after Yemen's truce expired, fighting largely remains on hold but a series of attacks by Huthi rebels could have serious repercussions for a country crippled by war.

At least three drone strikes at ports on Yemen's southern coast have disrupted oil exports, the main source of income for the Arab world's poorest country and its Saudi-backed government.

The strikes launched by the Iran-backed rebels since late October caused no casualties but stopped some tankers from docking at the government-controlled harbours of Qena and Al-Dabah.

Human rights protests at the World Cup have drawn everything from sympathy to indifference and outright hostility, with Qatar's critics often finding themselves in the firing line.

Germany's hands-over-mouths protest, a reaction to being barred from wearing a "OneLove" armband, was swiftly followed by accusations of anti-Arab racism and taunts over the country's Nazi past.

Other acts of support for Qatar's LGBTQ community and migrant workers, often by European teams or fans, have prompted more suspicion than solidarity from many around the world.

Germany will battle to avoid the humiliation of another first-round exit at the World Cup on Thursday while Belgium's "golden generation" will be fighting for their lives when they face Croatia.

Despite being holders, Germany were eliminated at the group stage four years ago in Russia, and they are desperate to avoid a repeat when they play Costa Rica in Group E.

The Germans suffered a stunning opening defeat to Japan but salvaged a draw with Spain in their next game.