Russia carried out air strikes on jihadist targets in northwestern Syria on Tuesday for the first time since it declared a truce on August 31, a war monitor said.

Unknown warplanes targeted an arms depot and posts of Iranian-backed militias in eastern Syria, near the Iraqi border, killing at least 18 fighters in a nighttime attack, Syrian opposition activists said Monday. A Syrian security official said Israeli jets staged the airstrikes, but denied there were any casualties.

The attack comes amid rising tensions in the Middle East and the crisis between Iran and the U.S. in the wake of the collapsing nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said that Cairo is supporting efforts to remove Sudan from Washington's blacklist of state sponsors of terrorism, a key factor hindering the African country's economic revival.

The United States' efforts to create a buffer zone in northern Syria have so far been "cosmetic", Turkey's foreign minister said on Tuesday, as he accused Washington of stalling.

Rwanda agreed Tuesday to take in hundreds and potentially thousands of African migrants stranded in Libya, a deal the African Union hopes to replicate with other member states. 

Shiite Muslims around the world are observing Ashoura, one of the most sacred religious holy days for their sect.

Hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq, Iran and Lebanon are marking the day with rallies, prayers and self-flagellation.

Israel moved into its final week of campaigning Monday for an unprecedented second general election in five months with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu battling for political survival while facing a potential corruption indictment.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday accused Iran of having a previously undisclosed site aimed at developing nuclear weapons that it destroyed.

Iran destroyed the site located near the city of Abadeh, south of Isfahan, sometime between late June and late July after realizing that Israel had detected it, Netanyahu alleged.

Videos posted online by an Egyptian construction contractor accusing President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and the military of corruption have gone viral, sparking a rare debate about the army's growing economic empire.

Hundreds of people protested Monday in front of a Moroccan court as the trial opened of a journalist accused of having a late-term abortion and sexual relations outside marriage.