As images and reports of starvation in besieged Syrian communities drew an international outcry and two rare aid convoys this month, an urgent question arose: Why not drop food and other needed supplies by air?

Humanitarian access is a key issue as the United Nations tries to get Syrian parties to peace talks tentatively set for Monday. And it's the focus of a pledging conference on Feb. 4 in London, with the leaders of countries including Germany and Iran expected to attend.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday said the U.S.-led coalition bombing Islamic State strongholds in Syria and Iraq will reach their goal of "seriously denting" the group by the end of 2016.

"I think that by the end of 2016, our goal of very seriously denting Daesh in Iraq and Syria and of trying to have an impact on Mosul and Raqa will be achieved," Kerry told reporters on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, using an alternative name for Islamic State (IS).

A global Muslim body on Thursday condemned the attacks on Saudi missions in Iran earlier this month and denounced Tehran's regional "interference."

Foreign ministers of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, in a statement, said it "condemns the aggressions against the missions of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in Tehran and Mashhad."

Islamic State military losses in Syria and Iraq may prompt some of its leaders to relocate to Libya where they will face less pressure, the EU's counter-terrorism coordinator said Thursday.

In an interview with AFP, Gilles de Kerchove also warned that the raids by the U.S.-led coalition and Russian warplanes as well as operations by Iraqi and Syrian ground troops could lead IS to stage more Paris-style attacks in Europe.

Israel's Interior Minister Aryeh Deri said Thursday he has revoked the permanent residency permits of four Palestinians from east Jerusalem who allegedly killed Israelis in Jerusalem in recent attacks.

The rare move is yet another Israeli attempt to stem the nearly four-month wave of Palestinian attacks against Israeli civilians and security forces, many of which were carried out by east Jerusalem residents. 

Around 22,000 jihadists have been killed by the U.S.-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group since mid-2014, France's defense minister said on Thursday.

"The figure given by the coalition... is about 22,000 dead since the start of operations in Iraq and Syria," Jean-Yves Le Drian told the France24 news channel, adding that the figure was "approximate."

The United States has approved the sale of almost $2 billion worth of bombs and missiles to equip Iraq's squadron of F-16 attack jets in their battle against jihadist rebels.

The Defense Security Cooperation Agency said 400 American government staff and contractors would work in Iraq until at least 2020 to maintain the arsenal and train Iraqi pilots and ground crew.

Dozens of Israeli Jews entered two homes in a building in the center of the Palestinian city of Hebron on Thursday, sparking violent clashes over disputed ownership claims, witnesses said.

The building stands near a religious site known to Jews as the Cave of the Patriarchs and to Muslims as the Ibrahimi Mosque in the heart of the flashpoint southern West Bank city. 

Pan-Arab television network Al-Jazeera said on Thursday that one of its journalists had gone missing in the battleground Yemeni city of Taez and that it suspects he was kidnapped.

The Doha-based channel said it had not been able to contact Hamdi al-Bokari since Monday night, when the correspondent was covering fighting between loyalist and rebel forces in the central city.

A bomb blast killed six people including three policemen Thursday as a team of officers raided an apartment in the Egyptian capital suspected to be a militant hideout, police said.

The explosion in Cairo's al-Haram district, near the pyramids, came ahead of Monday's anniversary of the 2011 revolution that ousted longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak.