The Pentagon said Friday it was cutting the number of troops and air defense units deployed to the Middle East, confirming a Wall Street Journal report that eight Patriot batteries were being moved out from the region.

Israel will provide around one million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to the Palestinian Authority ahead of their expiry, the Israeli prime minister's office said Friday.

"Israel has signed an agreement with the Palestinian Authority, and will supply approximately one million doses of Pfizer vaccine that is about to expire, and will receive in return the doses that Pfizer is to send to the Palestinian Authority," Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's office said in a joint statement with the defence and health ministries.

Israel's army chief heads this weekend to the United States for talks, the first top official to do so since the new coalition of Naftali Bennett, the army said Thursday.

A Palestinian teenager died Thursday of gunshot wounds inflicted the day before, when the Israeli army opened fire during clashes in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said.

Robots began handing out bottles of sacred water in Mecca this week in preparation for a socially distanced Hajj pilgrimage in Islam's holiest city, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Palestinian militants again launched incendiary balloons from Gaza Wednesday, hours after Israeli strikes in response to earlier cross-border fire attacks, the first flare-up since hundreds were killed in last month's conflict.

A Palestinian woman was shot dead in the West Bank on Wednesday, the Palestinian health ministry said, with the Israeli army saying she had tried to ram soldiers with a car.

Israeli aircraft carried out a series of airstrikes at militant sites in the Gaza Strip early Wednesday, the first such raids since a shaky cease-fire ended the war with Hamas last month.

The airstrikes targeted facilities used by Hamas militants for meetings to plan attacks, the Israeli military said, blaming the group for any act of violence emanating from Gaza. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Israel's fragile new government has shown little interest in addressing the decades-old conflict with the Palestinians, but it may not have a choice.

Jewish ultranationalists are already staging provocations aimed at splitting the coalition and bringing about a return to right-wing rule. In doing so, they risk escalating tensions with the Palestinians weeks after an 11-day Gaza war was halted by an informal cease-fire.

When Joe Biden entered the White House, he waited nearly a month to speak to Benjamin Netanyahu, fueling perceptions he was in no hurry to please the divisive Israeli leader.