Group of Seven foreign ministers met on Friday in France to discuss the Russia-Ukraine conflict, with deep divisions apparent over the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, following U.S. President Donald Trump's repeated complaints that America's allies have ignored or rejected requests for help in the military operation and in confronting Iran's retaliatory attacks, including the closure of the Strait of Hormuz to most international shipping.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio joined his counterparts from the G7 just 24 hours after Trump's latest round of insults lobbed at NATO and as instability in oil markets persisted with the Iran war entering its fourth week along with uncertainty over the status of potential negotiations to end the crisis.

Israel launched a new wave of strikes on Iran and threatened on Friday that its attacks "will escalate and expand" after U.S. President Donald Trump claimed talks on ending the war were going well and gave Tehran more time to open the Strait of Hormuz, though there have been no signs of Iran backing down.

With stock markets reeling and economic fallout from the war extending far beyond the Middle East, Trump is under growing pressure to end Iran's chokehold on the strait, a strategic waterway through which a fifth of the world's oil is usually shipped.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards urged civilians across the region on Friday to stay away from areas near U.S. forces, nearly a month into the war with the United States and Israel.

"The cowardly American-Zionist forces... are attempting to use civilian locations and innocent people as human shields," said the Guards in a statement on their Sepah News website.

U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday he would not yet strike Iranian power plants as previously threatened after a request from the government in Tehran, and added that talks with the Islamic republic were "going very well."

U.S. President Donald Trump denied Thursday he was desperate for a deal to end the Middle East war, insisting that Tehran was keen to come to the table despite the Islamic republic's cool response to an American peace plan.

Israel's main opposition leader Yair Lapid accused the government Thursday of steering Israel toward a "security disaster" due to a shortage of combat soldiers.

Iran has responded through unnamed intermediaries to a 15-point U.S. plan to end the war, news agency Tasnim reported on Thursday, and is now waiting for Washington's reply.

The exact contents of the U.S. plan, conveyed to Iran via Pakistan according to Pakistani officials, are not officially known.

U.S. President Donald Trump has told associates in recent days that he wants to avoid a protracted war in Iran and that he hopes to bring the conflict to an end in the coming weeks, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The Pentagon is developing military options for a "final blow" in Iran that could include the use of ground forces and a massive bombing campaign, two U.S. officials and two sources with knowledge told U.S. news portal Axios.

U.S. President Donald Trump's surprising claim this week that talks with Iran were yielding great progress has only raised more confusion over a war whose goals were already unclear. The most basic question: What talks?

A 15-point plan from the Trump administration offering a potential pathway to an exit was offered late Tuesday to Iran through Pakistan, according to a person briefed on the contours of the plan but who was not authorized to speak publicly about it.