The U.N. missions for 85 member states issued a joint statement Tuesday condemning Israel's encroaching control of the West Bank, which critics say amounts to de facto annexation of the Palestinian territory.

"We strongly condemn unilateral Israeli decisions and measures aimed at expanding Israel's unlawful presence in the West Bank," the statement reads. "Such decisions are contrary to Israel's obligations under international law and must be immediately reversed."

What began as an ordinary shift for Jerusalem bus driver Fakhri Khatib ended hours later in tragedy.

A chaotic spiral of events, symptomatic of a surge in racist violence targeting Arab bus drivers in Israel, led to the death of a teenager, Khatib's arrest and calls for him to be charged with aggravated murder.

Iran and Russia will conduct naval maneuvers in the Sea of Oman on Thursday, following the latest round of talks between Tehran and Washington in Geneva, Iranian media reported.

On Monday, the Revolutionary Guards, the ideological arm of Iran's military, also launched exercises in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, a challenge to U.S. naval forces deployed in the region.

Ukraine and Russia did not find agreement on the central issues of how to end the four-year at U.S.-mediated talks in Geneva, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Wednesday.

"We can see that some groundwork has been done, but for now the positions differ, because the negotiations were not easy," Zelensky said in a message to journalists, including from AFP, after the talks had finished.

The Israeli military announced that one of its soldiers had been killed in combat in southern Gaza on Wednesday, but a security source said the death appeared to have been caused by "friendly fire".

"Staff Sergeant Ofri Yafe, aged 21, from HaYogev, a soldier in the Paratroopers Reconnaissance Unit, fell during combat in the southern Gaza Strip," the military said in a statement.

School bus driver Ali al-Dorr averts his gaze every time he passes the rubble of his son's home -- destroyed by an Israeli strike in south Lebanon despite a year-old ceasefire.

Though his son managed to evacuate in time, the attack left notebooks, papers and furniture strewn among the debris of the apartment building in Qannarit, overlooking the coastal city of Sidon, the scene of several strikes in recent weeks that Israel says targeted Hezbollah.

A senior imam of the Al‑Aqsa Mosque in east Jerusalem said Tuesday that Israeli authorities have barred him from entering the compound, just days before the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tuesday the latest talks with the United States saw them agree on "a set of guiding principles" that would pave the way for a deal.

Veteran U.S. civil rights activist Reverend Jesse Jackson, one of the nation's most influential Black voices, died peacefully Tuesday morning at the age of 84, his family said.

Israeli NGOs have raised the alarm over a settlement plan signed by the government which they say would mark the first expansion of Jerusalem's borders into the occupied West Bank since 1967.