Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks before Congress Wednesday in hopes of bolstering U.S. support for continuing Israel's fight against Hamas and other adversaries, even as the Biden administration is urging him to focus on closing a deal ending the devastating nine-month war in Gaza.

Netanyahu is assured a warm welcome from Republican lawmakers who arranged his speech in the House chamber, an appearance making him the first foreign leader to address a joint meeting of Congress four times, surpassing Winston Churchill.

Germany's governing coalition and the conservative opposition on Tuesday presented a plan to protect the country's highest court against possible future manipulation or obstruction by extremist or authoritarian politicians.

Justice Minister Marco Buschmann cited experiences in Poland, Hungary and Israel as illustrating the need to bolster the Federal Constitutional Court. Germany's own political landscape has become increasingly fragmented in recent years, with the far-right Alternative for Germany party emerging as a significant political force.

Iran condemned on Tuesday the "reception and protection" of Israeli athletes at the Olympic games in Paris, demanding their exclusion over Israel's handling of the Gaza war.

Israel's delegation, which headed to France on Monday ahead of Friday's opening ceremony, is being tightly protected in the French capital amid growing international outrage over the the high civilian casualty toll and unfolding humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Vice President Kamala Harris has secured the support of enough Democratic delegates to become her party's nominee against Republican Donald Trump, according to an Associated Press survey, as top Democrats rallied to her in the aftermath of President Joe Biden's decision to drop his bid for reelection.

The quick coalescing behind Harris marked an attempt by the party to put weeks of internecine drama over Biden's political future behind them and to unify behind the task of defeating Trump with just over 100 days until Election Day. Prominent Democratic elected officials, party leaders and political organizations quickly lined up behind Harris in the day after Biden's exit from the race and her campaign set a new 24-hour record for presidential donations on Monday.

President Joe Biden says he's "determined to get as much done" as he possibly can in his final six months in the White House as he tries to beat back a defining force that his lame-duck predecessors struggled to vanquish: diminished relevance.

Biden hopes to keep the spigot flowing with hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funding from a series of major legislative wins early in his term — signature policy victories that could be undone should Republican Donald Trump return to the White House.

Ukrainian drones attacked a ship at a port in southern Russia, just across from the annexed Crimean peninsula, killing and injuring crew and workers, the local Russian governor said Tuesday.

"Drones attacked a ferry vessel in the port of Kavkaz," Krasnador governor Veniamin Kondratyev said in a post on Telegram. "Unfortunately there are injured and dead among the crew and port staff."

A Russian court has sentenced U.S.-Russian journalist Alsu Kurmasheva to six and a half years in prison for spreading "false information" about the military, a court spokesperson told AFP on Monday.

"Alsu Kurmasheva was sentenced. Six years, six months," Natalya Loseva, a spokesperson for the Supreme Court of Tatarstan, told AFP. Her employer, RFE/RL slammed the trial as a "mockery of justice".

A barrage of Ukrainian drones sparked a blaze overnight at an oil refinery and separately killed one person in southern Russia, officials in Russia and Ukraine said Monday.

Kyiv and Moscow have intensified fatal cross-border missile and drone attacks over recent months with both sides primarily targeting energy infrastructure.

Joe Biden's withdrawal from the U.S. presidential race injects greater uncertainty into the world at a time when Western leaders are grappling with wars in Ukraine and Gaza, a more assertive China in Asia and the rise of the far-right in Europe.

During a five-decade career in politics, Biden developed extensive personal relationships with multiple foreign leaders that none of the potential replacements on the Democratic ticket can match. After his announcement, messages of support and gratitude for his years of service poured in from near and far.

President Joe Biden's decision to step down as the Democratic Party's nominee for president opens the door for other contenders to become the Democratic nominee in November. The president has thrown his support behind Vice President Kamala Harris, and other prominent Democrats moved quickly to rally around her candidacy, but it's unclear just how smooth her path to the party's nomination is. Here are some of the leading contenders for a spot on the Democratic ticket:

Kamala Harris