Four people died and several were missing after violent storms triggered flash flooding, uprooting trees and ripping off roofs in southeastern France, authorities said Friday.

Helicopters, soldiers, divers and paramilitary police carried out dozens of rescue operations in the region, hit by weeks of successive storms and flooding.

A French-Moroccan youth has been jailed for two years for "advocating terrorism" by flying what looked liked the black flag of the Islamic State jihadist group, a news website said Friday

Abdelmalik el-Makrini, 18, was on holiday in Morocco when he was arrested in August for flying a flag on which is written "There is no god but God, and Mohammed is his prophet," the Tel Quel site said.

French authorities and NATO confirmed the presence of four Russian warships in the English Channel on Friday, but denied they were doing military exercises and said they were taking shelter due to bad weather.

Officials quickly sought to ease fears over the presence of the flotilla after Russian media reported they were planning military exercises, with East-West tensions sky-high over Russia's intervention in ex-Soviet Ukraine.

France's foreign minister Friday urged a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict within two years, as French MPs debated a symbolic motion to recognize Palestine as a state.

Laurent Fabius said the United Nations Security Council was working on a resolution to relaunch and conclude talks. "A deadline of two years is the one most often mentioned and the French government can agree with this figure," he told MPs.

Eight cars stolen in France and shipped to Lebanon have been seized at Beirut's port, the Internal Security Forces announced on Thursday.

“The bureau for combating international theft crimes managed on November 21 to seize at Beirut's port two containers carrying eight recent model Range Rovers and BMWs,” the ISF said in a statement.

First the dramatic comeback, then the frenzied campaign, and now France's ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy is limbering up for his potential springboard back into office: the leadership of his right-wing UMP party.

Pollsters expect the 59-year-old to sail through a vote on Saturday to head his bitterly divided party despite his much-heralded return to politics largely seen as having fallen flat. 

A French military delegation and officials at the Lebanese defense ministry reached a final agreement on the arms and ammunition that the army needs under the $3 billion Saudi grant announced last year, An Nahar daily reported on Thursday.

The newspaper said that the discussions between the Lebanese officials and the delegation, which includes military experts and representatives from French companies, settled the Lebanese army's request for aid to its ground, navy and air brigades.

France on Wednesday urged Egypt to continue its path towards democracy, as visiting president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi sought to restore his country's reputation with his first European tour after a deadly crackdown on opponents.

"We want the process to continue, a process of democratic transition which respects the roadmap and allows Egypt to succeed fully," said French President Francois Hollande at a joint news conference after talks with Sisi.

A French delegation arrived in Lebanon for a number of meetings with related officials to finalize the specific military needs of the Lebanese army under the Saudi grant.

The delegation comprises 30 representatives of the French state and the military industry and they are in Lebanon to finalize what kind of arms its army needs from the Saudi grant's remaining 150-300 million dollars, the An Nahar daily reported on Wednesday.

French President Francois Hollande on Tuesday delayed the controversial delivery of a high-tech warship to Russia "until further notice" over the Ukraine crisis.

"The President of the Republic considers that the current situation in eastern Ukraine still does not allow for the delivery of the first" warship, Hollande's office said in a statement.