France and Saudi Arabia are close to signing a $3 billion arms deal for Lebanon, the Elysee Palace said Monday following talks between President Francois Hollande and the Saudi crown prince.

"It will not be signed Monday but it is being finalized," an aide to the president said.

A French court Monday upheld a ban on a Muslim engineer from accessing nuclear sites, citing his links with jihadist networks but his lawyer said it was a case of Islamophobia.

The 29-year-old working for a firm subcontracted by energy giant EDF had been granted access to nuclear installations as part of his job throughout 2012 and 2013.

The United States urged Israel on Monday to reverse its latest plan to seize Palestinian land in the Bethlehem area of the occupied West Bank.

"This announcement, like every other settlement announcement Israel makes, planning step they approve, and construction tender they issue, is counterproductive to Israel's stated goal of a negotiated two-state solution with the Palestinians," a State Department official said. 

Saudi Arabia's crown prince arrived in Paris Monday for talks with President Francois Hollande likely to touch on a Saudi-financed French package of arms for Lebanon and the wider jihadist threat in the region.

Salman bin Abdul Aziz, who is also deputy prime minister and defense minister, will meet Hollande on Monday and will be treated to an official dinner at the Elysee presidential palace.

The death toll from an explosion in an apartment building outside Paris rose to seven on Monday, with rescue workers scrambling against time to find one last man still missing.

Local prefect Philippe Galli said a woman in her 80s who lived on the first floor was buried under the rubble after the four-storey residential block in the Paris suburb of Rosny-sous-Bois collapsed on Sunday morning.

A 22-year-old man suspected of acting as a recruiter for jihadist groups in Syria has been arrested at an airport in the south of France, the interior ministry said Sunday.

The man, who is said to be of Chechen origin, was stopped at the Nice airport on Saturday and taken into custody.

Syria on Sunday criticized France's President Francois Hollande for his refusal to cooperate with Damascus against jihadists from the extremist Islamic State group.

"The French president's insistence on pursuing his campaign of lies since the beginning of the crisis in Syria... has made his country one of those most responsible for the bloodshed in Syria," state news agency SANA quoted the foreign ministry as saying.

Two children and two women were killed on Sunday when an explosion ripped through an apartment building outside Paris, reducing half a residential block to rubble, emergency services said.

A child described as around 10 years old, as well as a boy aged 14 to 18, were among the bodies recovered from the remains of the four-story building in the northeastern suburb of Rosny-sous-Bois.

France's new economy minister touched off a political storm Thursday, only one day into the job, with comments made before he was appointed about the controversial "35-hour" labor law.

Emmanuel Macron, a former Rothschild banker and ex-adviser to President Francois Hollande, told Le Point weekly he was open to allowing companies and sectors of the economy to "depart from" the law limiting French employees to a maximum 35 hours of work per week.

Saudi Arabia's crown prince will next week visit France and hold talks with French leaders that will touch on the threat posed by Islamic State militants, presidency sources in Paris said Thursday.

Salman bin Abdul Aziz, who is also deputy prime minister and defense minister of Saudi Arabia, will meet President Francois Hollande on Monday and will be treated to an official dinner at the Elysee presidential palace.