Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said he will travel to Syria on Friday to encourage the country's transition following the ouster of President Bashar Assad by Islamist insurgents, and said Europe should review its sanctions on Damascus now that the political situation has changed.

Tajani presided over a meeting in Rome on Thursday of foreign ministry officials from five countries — Britain, France, Germany, Italy and the United States — after speaking earlier by telephone with his counterparts from Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau on Friday accused Algeria of "trying to humiliate France" after the North African country refused to admit one of its nationals who was being deported.

The influencer was arrested in the city of Montpellier on Sunday on charges of inciting violence in videos he posted on social media. French immigration officials put him on a flight to Algiers Thursday, but Algeria refused to admit him, saying he was banned from entering its territory. He was finally sent back to France that evening, the French interior ministry said.

The U.S. needs to keep troops deployed in Syria to prevent the Islamic State group from reconstituting as a major threat following the ouster of Bashar Assad's government, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told The Associated Press.

American forces are still needed there, particularly to ensure the security of detention camps holding tens of thousands of former IS fighters and family members, Austin said Wednesday in one of his final interviews before he leaves office.

Israeli soldiers recovered the body of a 53-year-old hostage in an underground tunnel in southern Gaza, the military said Wednesday, and the army was determining if another set of remains belongs to the man's son.

The discovery of Youssef AlZayadni's body comes as Israel and Hamas are considering a ceasefire deal that would free the remaining hostages and halt the fighting in Gaza. Israel says about a third of the remaining 100 hostages have died, but believes as many as half could be dead.

The U.S. military says it carried out Wednesday a wave of strikes against underground arms facilities of Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels.

U.S. Central Command said in a statement that strikes targeted weapons used by the rebels to attack ships in the Red Sea.

President-elect Donald Trump is dispatching his incoming special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, to Qatar this week for talks aimed at a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of some 100 Israeli hostages.

Trump speaking at a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort on Tuesday reiterated his threat that there will be “hell to pay” in the Middle East if the hostages are not released prior to his Jan. 20 inauguration.

Israel’s foreign minister was in the United Arab Emirates for talks with his Emirati counterpart.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry said that Gideon Saar discussed “regional developments and the bilateral relations between the two countries” in his talks with Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

Israeli airstrikes in southern Gaza killed at least 17 people late Tuesday, nearly all of them women or children, the territory’s Health Ministry said.

Five kids were killed in the same tent as they sheltered together in a camp for displaced Palestinians in Muwasi, said Ahmed al-Farra, director of the child ward at Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis. Their bodies were among the eight children and five women brought to the hospital.

Talks aimed at cementing a truce in Gaza between Israel and Hamas are ongoing, with "technical meetings" taking place between the parties, mediator Qatar's foreign ministry said Tuesday.

The Israeli military launched a wave of raids across the occupied West Bank overnight and into Tuesday, killing at least three Palestinians it said were militants a day after a deadly shooting attack.