Two Italian warships are sailing closer toward offshore Lebanon to protect Italy's soldiers participating in the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the South, An Italian news report said.

Italy currently has some 1,100 soldiers in the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon.

U.S. President Barack Obama's plan to conduct punishing military strikes on Syria passed its first congressional hurdle Wednesday, paving the way for full Senate debate on the use of force.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed an amended resolution 10-7, with one senator voting present, that authorizes U.S. military intervention with a 90-day deadline and bars U.S. boots on the ground for combat purposes.

Jon Stewart is back as host of "The Daily Show," and the shaggy beard he grew over the summer is gone.

In his return Tuesday, Stewart referenced stories he missed — celebrity cook Paula Deen, New York mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner's alter ego "Carlos Danger" and Miley Cyrus' sultry MTV dance — then took up the challenge of trying to make comedy and social commentary out of the Syrian poison gas attack.

Students at one U.S. university marked the start of the school year with a world record fruit salad weighing more than 15,000 pounds (6,800 kilograms).

A Guinness World Records representative certified the record.

President Vladimir Putin warned the West against taking one-sided action in Syria but also said Russia "doesn't exclude" supporting a U.N. resolution on punitive military strikes if it is proved that Damascus used poison gas on its own people.

In a wide-ranging interview with The Associated Press and Russia's state Channel 1 television, Putin said Moscow has provided some components of the S-300 air defense missile system to Syria but has frozen further shipments. He suggested that Russia may sell the potent missile systems elsewhere if Western nations attack Syria without U.N. Security Council backing.

The man who held three women captive in his home for nearly a decade before one escaped has been found dead and is believed to have committed suicide, a U.S. prison official said.

Ariel Castro, 53, was found hanging in his cell around 9:20 p.m. Tuesday at the Correctional Reception Center in Orient, a community located south of Columbus in central Ohio, JoEllen Smith, Department of Rehabilitation and Correction spokesman, said early Wednesday.

America's biggest pro-Israel groups are throwing their weight behind President Barack Obama's plan for U.S. military intervention in Syria.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as AIPAC, said Tuesday that congressional authorization for strikes against Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime would ensure that what it called "barbarism on a mass scale" does not go unanswered.

The World Bank is helping Lebanon prepare the ground to request an influx of international aid to offset the high costs of the spillover from the Syrian civil war, President Jim Yong Kim told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

Kim said in an interview that the Lebanese government asked the World Bank to take the lead in preparing a quick assessment of the social and economic impacts of the war in neighboring Syria. This analysis will be presented during a Sept. 25 meeting of an international support group for Lebanon at the United Nations General Assembly.

The Senate resolution authorizing U.S. President Barack Obama to use military force against Syria would bar American ground troops for combat operations and set a deadline for any action.

The Associated Press obtained a copy of the draft resolution that the Foreign Relations Committee will vote on Wednesday.

Leaving San Francisco, singer Chris Hart has made himself at home in "J-pop."

His album of cover versions of Japanese pop tunes is rising on the charts. And the crooner is scoring on this nation's equivalent of "American Idol," being billed as a genius who understands the musical soul of Japan.