The United Kingdom sent its fellow Security Council members an amended draft resolution on Libya Friday, calling for the withdrawal of mercenaries from the country, according to the text, seen by AFP.

A senior member of Syrian Islamist armed group Jaysh al-Islam has been arrested in France and charged with war crimes and torture, a judicial source told AFP on Friday.

Syrian regime forces were poised Friday to retake the rebel-held town of Saraqeb in the country's northwest where battles this week killed more than 400 combatants, a monitor said.

Once the throbbing heart of the uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime, Maaret al-Numan is an eerie ghost town where few buildings have been spared by nine years of war.

Following a major ground offensive, the Syrian army captured the town in the northwestern province of Idlib on Wednesday, a key prize in its push to reconquer the country's last rebel enclave.

Iraq's top Shiite cleric called Friday for parliamentary elections "as soon as possible" to ease the political crisis gripping the country since anti-government protests erupted four months ago. 

The number of US troops injured by an Iranian missile strike in Iraq this month has risen to 64, according to new figures released by the Pentagon.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday blasted several Arab countries for backing a Middle East peace plan unveiled by the United States, condemning it as "treason."

Israeli aircraft struck Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip early Friday in response to new rocket fire from the blockaded territory, the army said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday hailed US President Donald Trump's Middle East peace plan as a new opportunity after flying to Moscow to discuss it with President Vladimir Putin.

Air strikes by government ally Russia hit near a bakery and a medical clinic in Syria's rebel-held Idlib region early on Thursday, killing 10 civilians, a war monitor said.