The Palestinians are asking the U.N. Security Council to set November 2016 as the deadline for ending the Israeli occupation, according to a draft resolution obtained by Agence France-Presse on Wednesday. 

The draft, circulated to council members, follows Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' address last week to the U.N. General Assembly in which he called for a fast-track to statehood.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pressed the West on Wednesday to find a longterm solution to the crises in Syria and Iraq, saying dropping "tons of bombs" on Islamic State militants would only provide temporary respite.

Erdogan has pushed for the ousting of President Bashar Assad throughout the Syria crisis to settle the conflict and said that international action had to go well beyond air strikes.

An air strike on a base of the Islamic State jihadist group north of Baghdad killed nine militants Wednesday, a senior Iraqi military intelligence officer said.

The officer said a warplane from the international coalition against IS had destroyed a compound used by the organization in Danadish village, near the town of Hawijah.

Iraq's foreign minister said Wednesday that foreign assistance in the fight against the Islamic State jihadist group should respect the country's sovereignty.

He hailed the role played by Iran, which Kurdish officials said has been actively taking part in the fighting and still maintains a force on Iraqi territory.

France said Wednesday it will beef up its military deployment in the fight against Islamic State jihadists in Iraq being waged by a U.S.-led coalition.

"The president has decided to reinforce the military presence engaged" in the battle, said a statement from the presidency, without specifying what this would amount to.

Seven Sahrawi men who launched a hunger strike last month at a jail in Moroccan-annexed Western Sahara have ended their protest after being promised better conditions, Amnesty International said Wednesday.

Citing witnesses, the London-based watchdog said on September 19 that the men had been beaten in front of other detainees at the prison in Laayoune after being arrested at a demonstration in early 2014.

Turkish police on Wednesday detained three students at Istanbul University suspected of being sympathizers of the Islamic State (IS) group following clashes at an anti-jihadist campus protest, reports said.

Police stormed the university's faculty of humanities and science in Istanbul's Beyazit district after Islamist students armed with sticks and stones attacked another group protesting against IS.

Acts of violence across Iraq killed at least 1,119 people last month, according to U.N. figures released Wednesday excluding the restive western province of Anbar and casualties among jihadists.

The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) said at least 854 civilians and 265 members of the security forces were killed in September, and close to 2,000 injured.

Months after the collapse of U.S.-led efforts to advance Middle East peace, experts say Palestinians and Israelis have finally agreed on at least one thing -- further talks would be futile.

And, as has so often been the case in the intractable conflict, neither side looks set to propose any kind of meaningful alternative.

A Bahrain court lifted Wednesday a travel ban on a prominent activist charged with assaulting airport police as she flew in to try to visit her jailed father, a judicial source said.

Maryam al-Khawaja has been a vocal critic of the Bahrain authorities' crackdown on 2011 protests that led to her opposition leader father Abdulhadi al-Khawaja being jailed for life.