The United Nations mission to Libya has slammed ongoing violations of a 2011 U.N. Security Council arms embargo, despite commitments made a week ago at an international summit in Berlin.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voiced hope Sunday that he can "make history" in Washington this week during talks on US President Donald Trump's peace plan for the Middle East.

Syrian regime forces have reached the outskirts of a key city on the edge of the country's last rebel-held stronghold, a monitor and a pro-government newspaper said Sunday.

Huthi rebels have gained ground east of the Yemeni capital Sanaa, in what the defence minister acknowledged as a "tactical withdrawal" by government loyalists. 

Iraq's anti-government protests were dealt a blow after a powerful Shiite cleric withdrew his support from the movement, leading security forces to set fire to protesters' tents overnight Saturday in the country's south, as well as re-open key public squares in Baghdad that had been occupied by the demonstrators.

The presence of Muqtada al-Sadr's followers and his militia group had shielded the protesters from security forces and unknown groups looking to harm and suppress them, activists said. With that cover gone, many in the four-month-old movement feared the worst.

A Frenchman has been sentenced to 22 years in prison for seeking to recruit dozens of youths to fight as jihadists in Syria and for leading a brigade of French-speaking Islamists in the war-torn country.

Nearly three dozen US troops suffered traumatic brain injuries or concussion in this month's Iranian air strike on a military base in Iraq, the Pentagon said on Friday.

Four employees of a French Christian NGO, three French nationals and one Iraqi, have been missing in Baghdad since Monday, the charity announced Friday.

Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called Friday for the fragile truce in Libya to be turned into a lasting ceasefire, during a visit by the German leader to Istanbul.

Israeli police launched a manhunt Friday after an apparent arson attack, accompanied by Hebrew-language graffiti, on a mosque in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem.

"Police were summoned to a mosque in Beit Safafa, in Jerusalem, following a report of arson in one of the building's rooms and spraying of graffiti on a nearby wall outside the building," a police statement said.