U.S. military airstrikes in eastern Syria were a message to Iran and Tehran-backed militias that targeted American troops this month and several other times over the past year, the Pentagon said.

Colin Kahl, the undersecretary of defense for policy, told reporters on Wednesday that the U.S. airstrikes overnight on facilities used by militias backed by Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard demonstrated that "the United States will not hesitate to defend itself against Iranian and Iran-backed aggression when it occurs."

Dozens of Islamic Jihad militants have displayed life-sized replicas of their rockets during a parade in the Gaza Strip, in a show of defiance after three days of heavy fighting with Israel earlier this month.

The flare-up left 49 Palestinians dead, including the militant group's top two commanders and 10 other fighters, before an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire took effect. The militants fired some 1,100 rockets, but no one on the Israeli side was killed or seriously wounded.

Younes Ajil turns on the tap in his home but nothing comes out: dozens of villages are without running water in drought-hit Iraq, surviving on sporadic tanker-truck deliveries and salty wells.

Israel's prime minister called on President Joe Biden and Western powers to call off an emerging nuclear deal with Iran, saying that negotiators are letting Tehran manipulate the talks and that an agreement would reward Israel's enemies.

Yair Lapid called the emerging agreement a "bad deal" and suggested that Biden has failed to honor red lines he had previously promised to set.

Iran's foreign ministry on Wednesday denied any link with groups targeted by U.S. air strikes in Syria, contradicting a claim by Washington.

France has made several attempts over the years to heal the wounds with former colony Algeria, but it refuses to "apologize or repent" for the 132 years of often brutal rule that ended in 1962.

French President Emmanuel Macron heads to Algeria on Thursday seeking to soothe festering diplomatic tensions with an increasingly important supplier of gas to Europe. 

The U.S. military said early Wednesday it carried out airstrikes in eastern Syria that targeted areas used by militias backed by Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.

There was no immediate acknowledgment by Syria's state-run media of the strikes hitting Deir Ez-Zor. Iran as well did not acknowledge the attack.

Turkey said Tuesday that its restoration of full diplomatic relations with Israel did not mean a shift in Middle Eastern priorities as it prepared to welcome Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

The Palestinian leader was due to meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan later on Tuesday on his second visit to Turkey in a year.

Several hundred supporters of Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr launched a sit-in outside Iraq's top judicial body on Tuesday, ratcheting up tensions in a showdown with a rival Shiite alliance.

The Sadrists, who have already been camping outside parliament for the past three weeks, pitched tents outside the gates of the body's Baghdad headquarters, Iraq's official INA news agency reported.