US President Donald Trump on Monday angrily dismissed concerns over his plans to receive a jet from Qatar to be used as Air Force One, saying it would be "stupid" not to accept such a gift.

The offer from Qatar's royal family to donate the $400 million 747-8 to be used as the US presidential plane raised major questions about ethics and security, but Trump played them down.

"It's a great gesture," the 78-year-old billionaire told reporters at the White House when asked if the oil-rich Gulf state would expect anything in exchange.

US President Donald Trump on Monday left for Saudi Arabia on what he called a "historic" tour of the Middle East that will mix urgent diplomacy on Gaza and Iran with huge business deals.

Air Force One took off on a journey that will include visits to Qatar and the United Arab Emirates -- and possibly talks in Turkey on the Ukraine war.

Israel's war on Hamas in Gaza will hang heavy over the first major tour of Trump's second term -- but in one sign of progress, US-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander was handed over to the Red Cross just as the president boarded his plane.

Israel has asked the International Criminal Court to dismiss its arrest warrants against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant while ICC judges reconsider complex jurisdictional questions.

In a 14-page document dated May 9 but posted on the ICC website on Monday, Israel argued the warrants issued in November were null and void while judges weigh a previous Israeli challenge to the ICC's jurisdiction in the case.

The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon said Monday that since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah it had uncovered more than 225 weapons caches in the south and referred them to the army.

Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem urged Lebanon's government and the international community to act "more effectively" to make Israel comply with the November truce, which largely ended more than a year of hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed group, including two months of all-out war.

Saada Arbane has lived without a voice since her throat was slit during the Algerian civil war. But now, the 31-year-old woman has vowed to make herself heard after she said a best-selling novel plagiarised her life.

Kamel Daoud's novel "Houris" -- banned in Algeria and awarded France's top literary prize Prix Goncourt last year -- tells the story of a child who loses her voice when an Islamist cuts her throat during the 1990s war.

Hundreds of Palestinian Red Crescent staff marched in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah on Monday to protest the killing of medical workers in Gaza over the past 19 months of war.

Gathering in the city's Clock Square, medical personnel, support staff and volunteers wore white and orange vests and waved flags bearing the Red Crescent's emblem.

The demonstration marked World Red Cross and Red Crescent Day, usually observed on May 8, and called for the "protection for medical and humanitarian workers".

Gaza is at "critical risk of famine", with 22 percent of the population facing an imminent humanitarian "catastrophe" after more than two months of an aid blockade by Israel, a food security monitor warned Monday.

Gaza's entire population of around 2.4 million people is at risk of a food crisis "or worse" by September, the UN- and NGO-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) said in a report.

"Nineteen months into the conflict, the Gaza Strip is still confronted with a critical risk of famine," the IPC said.

A creeping Israeli presence is nothing new for the Bedouins who inhabit the arid hills east of Jerusalem, but a recently approved road in the area means the spectre of annexation now looms large.

Israeli authorities in March green lit the construction of a separate route for Palestinian vehicles to bypass a central stretch of the occupied West Bank –- one of the territory's most disputed parcels of land.

Israel has promoted the project as a way to further facilitate settlement expansion in the area near Jerusalem, which it considers its "eternal and indivisible" capital.

US President Donald Trump's Gulf tour this week will take him to Saudi Arabia, which he would like to see recognise Israel, and the neighbouring UAE which has benefitted from Israeli ties but also paid a price.

During his first term, Trump oversaw a series of normalisation deals between close ally Israel and several Arab countries, stunning public opinion in the Arab world and breaking with the long-held convention that a just resolution to the plight of Palestinians must precede relations with Israel.

France's foreign minister on Monday vowed an immediate and strong response from Paris after Algeria revealed plans to expel more French officials from Algerian territory after a similar move last month.

Relations between Algeria and France, the former colonial power in Africa's largest nation by land area, have been beset by a series of problems in recent months despite attempts by President Emmanuel Macron to promote reconciliation.