An Algerian court on Wednesday sentenced three opposition militants to six months in prison for insulting the president and spreading false news, a prisoners' rights group said.

A Jordanian court on Wednesday handed heavy prison terms to 11 people convicted of joining the Islamic State group and of planning attacks against churches and security personnel in the kingdom.

New Israeli air strikes on Syria have killed at least 57 people, the latest in hundreds of attacks on its strife-torn neighbor since its civil war began nine years ago.

Israeli warplanes carried out intense airstrikes in eastern Syria early Wednesday, apparently targeting positions and arms depots of Iran-backed forces as the region is on high alert. Dozens of fighters were killed or wounded, according to an opposition war monitoring group.

A senior U.S. intelligence official with knowledge of the attack told The Associated Press that the airstrikes were carried out with intelligence provided by the United States -- a rare incidence of publicized cooperation between the two countries over choosing targets in Syria. The official said the strikes targeted a series of warehouses in Syria that were being used in a pipeline to store and stage Iranian weapons.

A Moroccan court sentenced a 24-year-old to death Wednesday for the rape and murder of an 11-year-old boy, in a case that has sparked calls for renewed executions.

Israeli air strikes on east Syria killed 57 regime forces and allied Iran-backed fighters, in the deadliest such strikes since the start of the conflict, a war monitoring group said Wednesday.

The overnight raids against arms depots and military positions killed at least 14 Syrian regime forces, 16 Iraqi militia fighters and 11 Afghan members of the pro-Iran Fatimid Brigade, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The oldest son of Oman's sultan became the first crown prince in the country's history Tuesday as the Gulf state published a new "fundamental law" stipulating the line of succession.

The foreign ministers of Egypt, Jordan, France and Germany met in Cairo Monday in the latest push to revive Israeli-Palestinian talks stalled since 2014.

The European Union on Tuesday hit out at the decision by the United States to label Yemen's Huthi rebels as "terrorists", warning it could hinder peace efforts and aid deliveries. 

A leading Israeli human rights group has begun describing both Israel and its control of the Palestinian territories as a single "apartheid" regime, using an explosive term that the country's leaders and their supporters vehemently reject.

In a report released Tuesday, B'Tselem says that while Palestinians live under different forms of Israeli control in the occupied West Bank, blockaded Gaza, annexed east Jerusalem and within Israel itself, they have fewer rights than Jews in the entire area between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River.