The Israeli army on Thursday accused Iran and Hizbullah of stepping up attempts to build precision-guided missile production facilities in Lebanon, saying these efforts are putting Lebanese civilians in danger.

The announcement comes at a time of rising tensions. In recent days, Israel has struck Iranian targets in Syria and Iraq, and Hizbullah has accused Israel of a drone strike in Lebanon.

The United States is warning businesses against participating in an annual trade fare this week in the Syrian capital, Damascus.

The U.S. Embassy in Syria, which closed the mission early on in the country's eight-year civil war, posted a statement on Twitter ahead of the exhibition, which is expected to open on Wednesday.

Hizbullah is ruling out a wider war with Israel but says it will carry out a surprise attack in retaliation for an alleged Israeli drone assault south of Beirut over the weekend.

Naim Qassem told Russia Today in an interview that aired late on Tuesday that Hizbullah will not be "intimidated by threats of war in order not to retaliate. There was an aggression and we said we will retaliate and this is what will happen."

The Latest on the summit of leaders from the Group of Seven democracies (all times local):

10 p.m.

Iran's president has back-pedaled on possible talks with Donald Trump and now says the U.S. president first must lift sanctions imposed on Tehran.

Hassan Rouhani said on Tuesday that otherwise, a meeting between the two would be just a photo op and "that is not possible."

Seventy-five years ago, they helped free Europe from the Nazis. This weekend, U.S. veterans are back in Paris to celebrate, and commemorate.

Now in their 90s, these men aren't afraid to cry about what they saw in World War II. And they want everyone to remember what happened back then, so that it doesn't happen again.

Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil on Saturday assured that the Lebanese government takes seriously the ratings of Standard & Poor's and Fitch and will pursue serious and structural reforms, al-Joumhouria daily reported on Saturday.

Fitch Ratings downgraded Lebanon's long-term foreign currency issuer default rating to CCC from B- Friday, while Standard & Poor's Global Ratings affirmed its long- and short-term foreign and local currency sovereign credit ratings for Beirut at B-/B, saying the country's outlook remains negative.

The international rating agency's downgrade for Lebanon is another blow to the struggling economy of the small Arab country that is suffering from one of the world's highest debt ratios, high unemployment and little growth.

The world economy is getting shakier by the day, the Amazon has burned its way to the center of the climate change debate, and the leaders of the world's leading democracies will sit around a single table, theoretically charged with coming up with solutions for the biggest problems of the day.

Except that U.S. President Donald Trump is largely uninterested in international agreements, and other G-7 leaders are seriously hobbled at home by political scandal, low poll numbers or lame duck status. Welcome to the annual Group of Seven summit, which begins Saturday in the southern French resort town of Biarritz.

Airstrikes hit a hospital in a rebel-held village in northwestern Syria, knocking it out of service early on Wednesday, opposition activists said as government forces pressed their offensive on the last major rebel stronghold in the war-torn country.

There was no immediate word on casualties from the airstrike on the Rahma hospital in Tel Mannas, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Thiqa news agency, an activist collective.