Spain's top diplomat has announced a €10 million aid package for Lebanon's army, in a boost for the armed forces who have a crucial role in implementing a fragile Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire.

"This announcement of 10 million euros for the United Nations Development Program" will contribute to "supplement the salaries of the Lebanese Armed Forces" as well as finance "solar panels and logistical aspects" of the army, Jose Manuel Albares said Wednesday during a visit to Beirut.

U.S. President Joe Biden urged Americans Wednesday to stand guard against a "dangerous" oligarchy forming under Donald Trump as he delivered a dark farewell address before stepping down next week.

In a primetime speech from the Oval Office at the end of his single term in office, he warned of an ultra-wealthy "tech industrial complex" that he said could gain unchecked power over the American people.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump hailed a hostage release and ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas on Wednesday, agreed just five days before he returns to power.

An Israeli air strike for the first time hit a military target belonging to Syria's new Islamist-led authorities on Wednesday, killing three people, a war monitor and a medical source said.

"An Israeli drone launched an attack targeting a military convoy... killing two members of the Military Operations Department, and injuring another person" in southern Syria's Quneitra region, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. A medical source told AFP a local official was among the three killed in the strike.

Hamas has approved a Gaza truce and hostage release deal, Palestinian sources close to negotiations said Wednesday, after mediator Qatar expressed hope an agreement to end the war could be reached very soon.

After months of failed bids to end the deadliest war in Gaza's history, negotiators were making a final push in Qatar to seal a ceasefire.

Russia's army on Wednesday announced a small exchange of captured soldiers with Kyiv in a deal mediated by the United Arab Emirates.

"As a result of the negotiation process, 25 Russian servicemen were returned from territory controlled by the Kyiv regime. In return, 25 Ukrainian servicemen were handed over," Russia's defense ministry said on Telegram.

French leader Emmanuel Macron is due to visit Lebanon on Friday, both countries said, in the second such trip by a head of state since Lebanon elected a president last week.

Mediators were making a final push Wednesday to seal a Gaza truce and hostage release deal, after a Qatari official involved in the talks expressed hope an agreement could be reached "very soon".

Qatar, Egypt and the United States have intensified efforts to broker a ceasefire to enable the release of hostages taken during Hamas's October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas said on Tuesday that it hopes for "clear and comprehensive agreement" at the conclusion of an ongoing round of indirect negotiations in the Qatari capital for a truce in Gaza.

Hamas said in a statement it had held consultations with leaders of other Palestinian factions "where it informed them of the progress made in the negotiations underway in Doha," adding that the completion of the agreement "has reached its final stages" and the movement "hoped that this round of negotiations will end with a clear and comprehensive agreement".

Lebanon's new prime minister pledged Tuesday to extend state authority over all Lebanese soil after a November ceasefire ended a war between Hezbollah and Israel.

Nawaf Salam, in his first speech, said he would "extend the authority of the Lebanese state across all its territory" and "work seriously to completely implement U.N. resolution 1701" calling for Hezbollah to withdraw from south Lebanon.