Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday slammed a U.N.-backed declaration that famine was present in parts of Gaza, calling the report "an outright lie".

At least five Iranian police have been killed in an ambush in the restive southeast, Iranian media reported on Friday.

Russia's defense ministry on Friday said its troops have captured three villages in Ukraine's east Donetsk region, grinding closer to Kyiv's key defensive line in the embattled area.

Russia has captured "the settlements of Katerynivka, Volodymyrivka and Rusyn Yar in the Donetsk People's Republic," the ministry said on Telegram, using the name Moscow uses for the region that it claimed to have annexed in September 2022

The United Nations on Friday officially declared a famine in Gaza, the first in the Middle East, with its experts saying 500,000 people were facing "catastrophic" hunger.

After months of warning of the deteriorating humanitarian situation, the Rome-based IPC panel said famine was now confirmed in the Gaza Governorate -- Gaza City -- which covers about 20 percent of the Gaza Strip.

Three members of the security forces were killed and 19 wounded during the arrest of an opposition figure in Iraqi Kurdistan, two security officials told AFP on Friday.

"Three law enforcement agents were killed, including one belonging to the Assayish (special operations) branch, one from the anti-terrorist services and another from the 'Commandoes'" in the region's second city of Sulaimaniyah, where armed clashes accompanied the arrest of Lahur Sheikh Jangi, a member of the powerful Talabani family.

U.S. envoy Tom Barrack has hailed steps to begin disarming groups operating in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon.

Barrack congratulated Thursday the government and the Palestinian Fatah movement on their "agreement on voluntary disarmament in Beirut camps, a great accomplishment as a result of the bold action recently taken by the Lebanese Council of Ministers. A historic step toward unity and stability, showing true commitment to peace and cooperation."

Hundreds of members and backers of Tunisia's largest trade union rallied Thursday in support of the organisation, which has faced mounting pressure from President Kais Saied.

It was the largest demonstration Tunisia has seen in recent months, coinciding with what rights groups have denounced as a rollback of freedoms in the birthplace of the Arab Spring.

Wildfires have so far ravaged more than one million hectares (2.5 million acres) in the European Union in 2025, a record since statistics began in 2006, according to an AFP analysis of data from the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS).

Surpassing the record of 988,524 hectares burnt in 2017, the figure reached 1,015,731 hectares by midday Thursday, representing an area larger than Cyprus.

The French wine exporters federation said Thursday it was "hugely disappointed" by the European Union's admission that it failed to secure a tariff exemption for the sector in the US-EU trade deal.

"We are certain that this will create major difficulties for the wines and spirits sector," the head of the wine and spirits federation FEVS Gabriel Picard said, while France's minister for trade Laurent Saint-Martin said his government would seek "additional exemptions" as part of the US-EU trade deal.

Armed Palestinian groups in Lebanese refugee camps will start handing over their weapons to the authorities on Thursday, a joint committee said, following a deal reached in May.

"Today marks the beginning of the first phase of the process of handing over weapons from inside the Palestinian camps," Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee chairman Ramez Dimashkieh said in a statement.