Fourteen Turkish soldiers were killed and 33 wounded in clashes with Islamic State (IS) jihadists in Syria on Wednesday in the military's highest single day toll of its four month campaign inside the country.

Israeli ex-president Moshe Katsav was freed from prison Wednesday after prosecutors declined to appeal a parole board decision to release him after he served five years of a seven-year term for rape.

Tens of thousands of displaced Syrians say they have become trapped in an "open-air prison" in the northwestern province of Idlib which they fear will be the army's next target.

Mohammed Abdulrazzaq was gathering water in Mosul when shrapnel tore into his legs, making him one of a growing number of wounded from the battleground Iraqi city putting huge strains on hospitals.

Police in Bahrain on Wednesday clashed with protesters supporting a top Shiite cleric who has been stripped of his citizenship and is on trial in the Sunni-ruled kingdom, activists said.

Evacuations from the last rebel-held pocket of Aleppo resumed on Wednesday despite heavy snowfall, clearing a path for Syria's army to take full control of the devastated city.

Jordanian security forces have arrested a man suspected of funding an attack by the Islamic State group that killed 10 people including a Canadian tourist, a security source said Wednesday.

The Islamic State group is "indiscriminately" attacking civilians who refused to retreat along with the jihadists in the Iraqi city of Mosul, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.

The US military has officially ended operations in a former Islamic State bastion in Libya, officials announced Tuesday.

A Japanese programme aimed at accepting a small number of refugees from war-torn Syria is under fire for implying that pregnant women are not welcome.