Sana'a, Yemen - A prominent Yemeni cleric on Monday called on Arab leaders to open camps for training volunteers to fight Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip.

"Allow your people to volunteer. Allow your people to carry out their duty. Open camps for volunteers," Abdul-Majeed al-Zendani said in an address to a pro-Palestinian rally in Sana'a.

He said if training camps are opened in Arab countries, "millions of youths would join."

"Where are Arab defence ministers? Where are Arab and Muslim Armies?" al-Zendani questioned.

Sana'a, Yemen  - Yemeni tribesmen have released a South African tourist and her two sons unharmed, a day after they kidnapped them in the southern province of Abyan to press for the release of a jailed fellow clansman, police officials said late Saturday.

The woman, the boys, ages 10 and 13, as well as a Yemeni driver were kidnapped on Friday as they drove on a highway from the south- eastern province of Hadhramout to the port city of Aden.

Armed tribesmen from the al-Maraqisha tribe stopped the family's vehicle near al-Khubar, 170 kilometres east of Aden.

Sana'a, Yemen - Yemeni tribesmen seeking the release of a jailed fellow clansman kidnapped a South African tourist and her two sons in the southern province of Abyan, police officials said Saturday.

The woman, the boys aged 10 and 13, as well as a Yemeni driver were kidnapped late Friday as they drove on a highway from the south-eastern province of Hadhramout to the port city of Aden, the officials said.

Armed tribesmen from the al-Maraqisha tribe stopped the South African family's vehicle near the al-Khubar town, 170 kilometres east of Aden.

They forced the driver to switch to an unpaved road leading to a mountainous area, around 30 kilometres from the highway, one police official told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

Sana'a - Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh ordered a major fundraising campaign for the Palestinians as Israeli air strikes on the Gaza strip continued Friday, the official Saba news agency said.

Saleh entrusted a local pro-Palestinian NGO with leading the country-wide campaign, the agency said.

He urged Yemenis to "open-handedly contribute for their Palestinian brothers in the Gaza Strip who are subjected to the barbaric aggression and atrocities by the Zionist occupation forces," Saba said.

Saleh also ordered an "urgent shipment of medical and food supplies" to Gaza through Egypt.

Sana'a, Yemen  - Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of the Yemeni capital Sana'a and several other main cities on Sunday to protest against the Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip.

The largest gathering was in Sana'a, where around 80,000 people rallied in the city's main football stadium, police officials said.

Thousands of protesters also took part in anti-Israeli demonstrations in the cities of Aden, Dhalea, Taiz, Houdieda, Dhamar, Abyan and Lahj, they said.

In Sana'a, protesters held up pictures of the leaders of Hamas movement and the Palestinian flag alongside with banners denouncing the Israeli attacks.

Sana'a, Dec. 25, 2008 -- A convoy of trucks carrying 115 tons of relief assistance, including food items, winter cloths, blankets and other essential items, has arrived in this Yemeni town of Seyun as part of a humanitarian programme launched by the UAE Red Crescent Authority to help alleviate the sufferings of the victims of the flood that hit Wadi Hadramaut in recent time.

The RCA delegation accompanying the convoy distributed the relief assitance to the affected families in the town of Shubam.