Summer heat scorched Texas and the Southwest on Wednesday, pushing Phoenix to nearly 90 consecutive days of triple-digit temperatures and putting millions of people under excessive heat warnings.

Meanwhile, energy demand in Texas hit an unofficial all-time high Tuesday, according to data from the state's grid operator.

Floodwaters have stranded hundreds of thousands of people in India's northeast and neighboring Bangladesh's eastern region, causing at least 15 deaths as rescuers struggled to reach those who needed help, officials and media reports said Thursday.

At least 11 people were killed and thousands displaced from homes as floods and mudslides have ravaged India's northeastern Tripura state, bordering Bangladesh, since Wednesday.

President Voldymyr Zelensky toured the northeastern Ukrainian region of Sumy on Thursday in his first visit to the border area since his forces entered Russian territory more than two weeks ago.

During a meeting with Ukraine's military commander, Zelensky said Ukrainian forces have claimed control of another settlement in the Russian region of Kursk and taken more Russian prisoners of war whom he hopes to exchange for captured Ukrainians.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has met with Chinese premier Li Qiang, hailing growing trade relations as Moscow becomes increasingly dependent on Beijing for political and economic support.

"Our trade relations are developing, developing successfully ... The attention that the governments of the two countries on both sides are paying to trade and economic ties is yielding results," Putin said at the meeting in the Kremlin Wednesday.

A drone attack sparked a fire at a military facility in the Volgograd region of southern Russia on Thursday, regional officials and the country's Ministry of Defense said.

Regional Volgograd Governor Andrei Bocharov said on Telegram that a "defense ministry facility" was on fire after being attacked with drones in the area of Marinovka. There were no casualties, he said.

At his first outdoor rally since last month's attempted assassination, Donald Trump spoke from behind bulletproof glass Wednesday in North Carolina at an event focused on national security. On politics, he called his predecessor Barack Obama "nasty" for his comments the night before at the Democratic National Convention.

Trump blamed President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for the deadly Afghanistan withdrawal and for wars in Ukraine and the Middle East while returning repeatedly in his remarks to the Democratic gathering in Chicago, where speaker after speaker has assailed Trump as a threat to the country should he return to the White House.

The Palestinian Health Ministry says three people have been killed in an Israeli strike on a home in the occupied West Bank.

It said the apparent strike was carried out overnight into Thursday in the Tulkarem refugee camp, a built-up residential area dating back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation. It did not say whether those killed were fighters or civilians.

A French destroyer rescued 29 mariners from an oil tanker that came under repeated attack in the Red Sea, officials said Thursday, while also destroying a bomb-carrying drone boat in the area.

Yemen's Houthi rebels are suspected to have carried out the assault on the Sounion, though they have yet to claim responsibility for the attack.

Iran's hard-line parliament has approved all members of reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian's Cabinet, the first time in over two decades a leader has been able to get all of his officials through the body.

The approval marks an early win for Pezeshkian, a longtime lawmaker who found himself catapulted into the presidency after a helicopter crash in May killed his hard-line predecessor.

Key mediator Egypt has expressed skepticism about the proposal meant to bridge gaps in cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas as more details emerged a day before negotiations were expected to resume in Cairo.

The challenges around the so-called bridging proposal appeared to undermine the optimism for an imminent agreement that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken carried into his latest Mideast visit this week.