The United States has said that West Bank settlers' killing of a 19-year-old Palestinian was "terror," sharpening its tone on far-right Israeli violence.

The State Department's bureau in charge of the Middle East in a weekend post on Twitter, which has been rebranded X, strongly condemned the "terror attack by Israeli extremist settlers."

Islamic State group militants killed 10 Syrian troops and pro-government fighters in the former jihadist stronghold of Raqa province, a war monitor said Tuesday, displaying their ability to keep mounting deadly attacks.

Despite losing their last piece of territory in Syria in 2019, IS has maintained hideouts in the vast Syrian desert from which it has carried out ambushes and hit-and-run attacks.

A baby girl who was born under the rubble of her family home destroyed by the deadly earthquake that hit Turkey and Syria six months ago is in good health, loves her adopted family and likes to smile even to strangers.

The dark-haired baby Afraa survived 10 hours under the rubble after the Feb. 6 earthquake crushed to death her parents and four siblings in the northern Syrian town of Jinderis. When she was found, her umbilical cord was still connected to her mother.

Israeli troops have killed three alleged Palestinian militants in the northern West Bank, further escalating a wave of violence in which two other people, including a young Palestinian man believed to have been gunned down by extremist Jewish settlers, were killed over the weekend.

The Israeli army said it shot the three men near the Jenin refugee camp — the site of a large-scale military operation last month. It said the three men had just exited the camp and were on their way to carry out an attack and that an M-16 rifle was recovered from their vehicle.

Russia's Foreign Ministry on Monday chided efforts by international officials meeting in Saudi Arabia to find a peaceful settlement for the war in Ukraine, saying the talks don't have "the slightest added value" because Moscow — unlike Kyiv — wasn't invited.

Senior officials from around 40 countries gathered Sunday in Jeddah for a two-day meeting that aims to agree on key principles about how to end the conflict that has raged for more than 17 months.

A Palestinian teenager died Monday days after being shot by an Israeli settlement guard in the occupied West Bank, officials said, the latest fatality in a surge of violence.

The Palestinian health ministry said 17-year-old Ramzi Fathi Hamed "died after being shot by the occupation (Israel) a few days ago in Silwad", a Palestinian village northeast of Ramallah.

Four Syrian soldiers and two Iran-backed fighters were killed Monday in pre-dawn Israeli strikes near Damascus, a war monitor said, in the latest deadly Israeli air raid to hit war-torn Syria's capital.

The airstrikes targeted Syrian regime forces, and military positions and weapons depots used by armed groups supported by Tehran, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Israeli military on Sunday prepped the family home of a Palestinian gunman for demolition, a day after he killed an Israeli security guard in an attack.

On Saturday a Palestinian gunman shot and killed 42-year-old security guard Chen Amir in central Tel Aviv. The attacker, identified by police as 27-year-old Kamel Abu Bakr, was shot at the scene and died later in hospital.

Saudi Arabia is hosting talks on the Ukraine war on Saturday in the latest flexing of its diplomatic muscle, though expectations are mild for what the gathering might achieve.

Syria's main insurgent al-Qaida-linked group denied it was behind the killing of the Islamic State group's leader in the country's northwest saying it would have otherwise claimed responsibility.

The security arm of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, made the announcement Friday night, a day after IS blamed the Syrian insurgent group for the death of its little-known leader, Abu al-Hussein al-Husseini al-Qurayshi, who headed the extremist organization since November.