Middle East

Israel has withdrawn its troops from the Gaza Strip to "defensive positions" outside the Palestinian territory.

A seven-hour "humanitarian window" announced by Israel has come into effect in parts of Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned of a "prolonged" military campaign in Gaza.

Israel has denied that one of its soldiers had been captured by Hamas in overnight fighting, as the death toll in the Gaza Strip passed 500, the Gaza health ministry said.

Ashkelon, Israel (CNN) -- Malka Davidovich's Sunday started as her days normally do. She went to work.

The UN Security Council has called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza after holding an emergency closed-door meeting on the crisis.

Israel says that 13 of its soldiers have died since Saturday night in its ground offensive in the Gaza Strip.

Gaza City (CNN) -- Hundreds of Palestinians fled in panic into Gaza City on Sunday as Israeli troops focused their firepower on the nearby town of Shaja'ia. The shelling and bombing killed at least 60 people and wounded 300, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

Israel is prepared to "significantly widen" its ground offensive against militants in the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said.

The Israeli military has begun a ground offensive against Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, extending its 10-day-old Operation Protective Edge.

The Israeli air force bombed 160 targets in the Gaza Strip overnight as it pressed a wide-scale campaign to stop volleys of Palestinian rocket fire, an army official said Wednesday.

Dozens of people have been injured in the largest clashes in occupied East Jerusalem in years, as Palestinian residents of the city fought with police after the mutilated body of a boy was found dumped in a forest outside the city.

The three Israeli teenagers who went missing earlier this month in the West Bank have been found dead.

Islamist militant group Isis has said it is establishing a caliphate, or Islamic state, on the territories it controls in Iraq and Syria.

Reports that Syrian warplanes carried out a cross-border attack on Iraqi towns this week is further evidence of the blurring between the two countries' borders as they face an offensive by Islamic extremists.At least 57 Iraqi civilians were killed and more than 120 others were wounded by what local officials say were Syrian warplanes that struck several border areas of Anbar province Tuesday.

Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has rejected calls for a national salvation government to help counter the offensive by jihadist-led Sunni rebels.Such calls represented a "coup against the constitution and an attempt to end the democratic experience", he warned.

Egypt's president has said he will not "interfere" with the judiciary over the sentencing of al-Jazeera journalists in Cairo, which triggered global outrage.Abdul Fattah al-Sisi said "we must respect judicial rulings and not criticise them even if others do not understand this".

US Secretary of State John Kerry has arrived in Iraq's capital, Baghdad, as Sunni insurgents expand their control of towns across north-western Iraq.In Egypt on Sunday, Mr Kerry warned that Sunni militants Isis' "ideology of violence and repression is a threat not only to Iraq but to the entire region".

Three al-Jazeera journalists accused of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood have been sentenced to seven years in jail in Egypt. A court in Cairo convicted Peter Greste, Mohammed Fahmy and Baher Mohamed of spreading false news and supporting the banned Islamist group.

A car bomb has killed at least 34 people in a Syrian government-controlled village in central Hama province, state media say.