The United States mediation to solve a dispute between Lebanon and Israel over oil drilling rights and a controversial separation wall “have reportedly failed,” media reports said on Wednesday.

A string of court cases and judicial investigations against Lebanese media figures is testing this country's reputation as a forum for ideas in a region blanketed by censorship and threats to the press.

Lebanese authorities are getting tough on free speech ahead of national elections, summoning two leading talk show hosts to court over on-air remarks and sentencing an analyst to jail for comments she made in Washington about the Lebanese army.

A 63-year-old Oklahoma man convicted of murder and a hate crime in the fatal shooting of his Lebanese neighbor was sentenced Tuesday to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Stanley Vernon Majors was convicted earlier this month of gunning down 37-year-old Khalid Jabara outside of his Tulsa home in August 2016. The murder charge carried a life sentence, and the jury recommended that Majors never get the chance to go free -- a recommendation the judge followed Tuesday.

Lawyers for one of four alleged Hizbullah members accused of involvement in the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri called Tuesday on judges at the U.N.-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon to acquit him, saying prosecutors have not presented enough evidence for a conviction.

"Even taken at its highest, the prosecution evidence is not sufficient" to convict Hussein Hassan Oneissi, his lawyer Vincent Courcelle-Labrousse told the STL.

Iranian search and rescue teams on Monday reached the site of a plane crash that authorities say killed all 65 people on board, Iran's Press TV reported.

The Aseman Airlines ATR-72, a twin-engine turboprop used for short-distance regional flying, went down on Sunday in foggy weather, crashing into Mount Dena in a remote area of southern Iran. The airliner said all on board Flight EP3704 were killed, including six crew members.

Drilling companies working offshore Israel have sent “warning signals” to Israeli authorities that escalating a dispute with Lebanon over oil drilling rights "could push them to withdraw which prompted Israel to de-escalate” tensions, al-Joumhouria daily reported on Saturday.

A federal grand jury in Minnesota indicted three people on charges that they conspired to export drone parts and technology from the U.S. to the Iranian-backed Hizbullah in Lebanon, authorities announced Friday.

The U.S. Attorney's office for Minnesota said two of the suspects — brothers Usama and Issam Hamade — are now in custody in South Africa, while the third, Samir "Tony" Berro, remains at large.

The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross said Friday the international community should consider "humanitarian exemptions" to economic sanctions against Libya.

A top Iranian general has lashed out at Israel during a commemoration for a top Hizbullah figure killed in a 2008 Damascus car bombing that the group blamed on Israel.

Qassem Soleimani, head of Iran's Quds Force, pledged retaliation for Imad Mughniyeh, Hizbullah's ex-military chief who was considered one of the world's most-wanted "terrorists" by Israel and the United States.

Hizbullah's actions pose a threat to the security of Lebanon and have a destabilizing influence in the Middle East, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Thursday.