The top leader of Yemen's Houthi rebels has threatened to target U.S. warships if attacks are launched against Yemen, a day after Washington announced a new international coalition to protect commercial vessels sailing through the Red Sea.

For weeks, the Iran-backed rebels in Yemen have been attacking ships transiting the Red Sea with drones and ballistic missiles. The group has said their attacks aim to end Israel's military offensive in the Gaza Strip. But the Israeli ties to the commercial ships targeted by the hardline Shia force have grown more tenuous with each attack.

The Israeli military says it has uncovered a major Hamas command center in the heart of Gaza City, inflicting what it described as a serious blow to the Islamic militant group as pressure grows on Israel to scale back its devastating military offensive in the coastal enclave.

The army said it had exposed the center of a vast underground network used by Hamas to move weapons, militants and supplies throughout the Gaza Strip. Israel has said destroying the tunnels is a major objective of the offensive.

The United States, key allies and Arab nations engaged in high-level diplomacy in hopes of avoiding another U.S. veto of a new U.N. resolution on desperately needed aid to Gaza ahead of a long-delayed vote now scheduled for Thursday morning.

The U.S. has been struggling to change the text's references to a cessation of hostilities in the Israel-Hamas war. Another sticking point is the inspection of aid trucks into Gaza to ensure they are only carrying humanitarian goods. The current draft proposes a U.N. role, an idea Israel is likely to oppose.

Ethiopia and Egypt said the latest round of talks over a huge, highly contentious hydroelectric dam Ethiopia has built on the Nile's main tributary again ended with no deal.

The countries blamed each other after three days of discussions in Addis Ababa concluded on Tuesday.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin flew out to the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier Wednesday to meet with the sailors he has ordered to remain at sea to prevent the Israel-Hamas war from spilling over into a deadlier regional conflict.

Austin has been in the region to press Israel to shift its bombardment of Gaza to a more limited campaign and more quickly transition to address Palestinian civilians' dire humanitarian needs.

Kuwait's new emir Sheikh Meshal al-Ahmed al-Sabah on Wednesday criticised parliament and cabinet for harming national interests as he was formally sworn in before lawmakers as the country's 17th ruler.

Officially taking over from his half-brother Sheikh Nawaf, who passed away on Saturday, Sheikh Meshal is faced with the task of pulling the country out of longstanding political paralysis and reforming a bloated public sector that have turned Kuwait into one of the Gulf's most laggard states.

Hopes rose Wednesday that Israel and Hamas may be inching toward another truce and hostage release deal in the Gaza war, following secret talks and as the head of the Palestinian militant group visited Egypt.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu late Tuesday told relatives of some of the remaining 129 captives held in Gaza since the October 7 attacks that his spy chief was working on efforts to "free our hostages".

The Security Council's adoption of a new U.N. resolution to spur desperately needed aid to Gaza has been bogged down by two issues important to the United States: a reference to a cessation of hostilities and putting the U.N. in charge of inspecting trucks to ensure they are actually carrying humanitarian goods.

A vote on the Arab-sponsored resolution, first postponed from Monday, was pushed back again until Wednesday as council members continued intense negotiations to avoid another veto by the United States.

The Israeli army said Tuesday it had demolished the family home of a Palestinian man accused of killing two Israelis -- a father and his son -- at a car wash in the occupied West Bank.

Police arrested Osama Bani Fadl in November after a months-long hunt, accusing him of killing Shay Silas Nigrekar and Aviad Nir in the Palestinian town of Houwara in August.

Israeli forces raided one of the last functioning hospitals in Gaza's north and bombarded the south with airstrikes that killed at least 28 Palestinians, pressing ahead with their offensive Tuesday with renewed backing from the United States, despite rising international alarm.

The air and ground war, launched in response to Hamas' Oct. 7 attack into Israel, has killed nearly 20,000 Palestinians, displaced some 1.9 million, demolished much of northern Gaza and sparked attacks on U.S. and Israeli targets across the region.