Iraqi armed factions backed by Tehran said Wednesday that they were "not bound by any timeline or agreement" to surrender their weapons to the state, as the government seeks to disarm them under mounting U.S. pressure.

A plane heading to Tel Aviv from Dubai was forced to make an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, after one of the pilots allegedly tried to crash the plane and kill everyone onboard.

Israeli leaders said on Wednesday that a "jihadist" pilot had aimed to crash a flydubai plane with mostly Israeli passengers, who overpowered him and prevented a "major disaster".

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that one of the pilots of a flydubai plane bound for Tel Aviv had planned to crash it and kill its mostly Israeli passengers, who stopped a "major disaster."

"During the flight, as they approached the country, one of the pilots stabbed the other pilot, and apparently tried to crash the plane with everyone on board," Netanyahu said in a video message, calling the passengers "heroes" who "prevented a major disaster."

The emergency landing Wednesday of a Tel Aviv-bound flydubai flight was due to a "terrorist" who wanted to crash the plane and kill Israelis, Israel's far-right national security minister said.

"The naive notion that our enemies cherish life and that we should pity them received another reminder this morning in the form of a terrorist who planned to crash a plane and murder the 180 Israelis on board," Itamar Ben Gvir said in a statement.

Gaza City's Al-Shifa Hospital said an Israeli airstrike targeting a vehicle killed five people on Wednesday, with the territory's civil defense agency confirming the toll.

Al-Shifa reported that "five martyrs and 13 injured arrived to the hospital following an Israeli airstrike that targeted a vehicle near the destroyed cabinet headquarters in the Tel al-Hawa neighborhood". AFP has contacted the Israeli military for a response.

Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad group have agreed to form an unlikely electoral coalition with a former top Fatah official who has close ties to the United Arab Emirates, Israel's closest ally in the Middle East, Palestinian officials told The Associated Press.

The alliance could be well positioned to threaten the dominance of President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party over the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority — but only if the first national elections in 20 years actually happen, which is very much in doubt.

The U.S. military announced on Wednesday that it has completed the withdrawal of its troops from Iraq, ending a 12-year mission to fight the Islamic State group.

The last U.S. troops left the last air base where they had been present in northern Iraq under an agreement between Baghdad and Washington.

Iranian officials indicated Wednesday they have received an official U.S. response to Tehran's latest proposal to end the seven-month war, which U.S. President Donald Trump had publicly rejected just days earlier.

The officials did not say what the response contained, and whether it was a rejection or not.

The last U.S. troops were slated to leave Iraq on Wednesday under an agreement between Baghdad and Washington, a move celebrated by Iran-backed groups but which some other Iraqis found concerning, particularly in the Kurdish region.

U.S. troops invaded Iraq in 2003 to topple Saddam Hussein. They departed in 2011, but three years later, Iraqi authorities invited a smaller U.S.-led mission to fight the Islamic State group, which had rampaged across Iraq, seizing large swaths of territory.