(Reuters) -Israeli far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich approved plans overnight for a settlement that would split East Jerusalem from the occupied West Bank, a move his office said would bury the idea of a Palestinian state.

It was not immediately clear if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu backed the plan to revive the long-frozen E1 scheme, which Palestinians and world powers have said would lop the West Bank in two and will likely draw international ire.

Cholera has claimed at least 40 lives in Sudan's Darfur region over the last week as the country weathers its worst outbreak of in years, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said on Thursday.

At a cholera isolation tent at a Sudanese displacement camp, an AFP journalist saw women and a young girl receiving intravenous fluids, while exhausted and weak patients sprawled on camp beds.

Citing rising cases of cholera which "exacerbate the worst effects of malnutrition", the European Union called on all parties to "urgently" allow in international aid.

New Israeli legislation regulating foreign aid groups has been increasingly used to deny their requests to bring supplies into Gaza, a joint letter signed by more than 100 groups said Thursday.

Ties between foreign-backed aid groups and the Israeli government have long been beset by tensions, with officials often complaining the organisations are biased.

The rocky relations have become even more strained since Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel triggered the Gaza war.

By Alexander Dziadosz

RAFAH, Egypt (Reuters) - -Boxes of Gaza-bound aid turned back by Israel on Sunday languished atop a truck and flatbed trailer parked metres from its border with Egypt, as exasperated drivers and U.N. officials criticised delays in sending food and medicine to the enclave.

At least 26 migrants died Wednesday when two boats sank off the coast of Italy's Lampedusa island, with around 10 others still missing, the coastguard and UN officials said.

Around 60 people were rescued after the sinkings in the central Mediterranean, a stretch between North Africa and Italy described by the UN as the world's most dangerous sea crossing for migrants.

The two boats had left Tripoli, Libya, earlier in the day, according to the Italian coastguard.

NAIROBI (Reuters) -South Sudan is not in talks with Israel to resettle Palestinians from war-torn Gaza, South Sudan's foreign ministry said on Wednesday.

On Tuesday, the Associated Press, citing six people with knowledge of the matter, reported that Israel was holding discussions with Juba to resettle Palestinians from Gaza in the East African nation.

"These claims are baseless and do not reflect the official position or policy of the Government of the Republic of South Sudan," South Sudan's foreign affairs ministry said in a statement.

Turkey's foreign minister and his Syrian counterpart on Wednesday warned Israel not to stir up chaos in Syria and demanded an end to all external interventions aimed at destabilising the war-torn country.

"Certain actors are bothered by the positive developments in Syria," Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said after talks with Syria's Asaad al-Shaibani in Ankara, referring to Israel and Kurdish YPG fighters operational in northeastern Syria.

Lebanese leaders firmly rejected any efforts at foreign interference during a visit by Iran's security chief Wednesday, with the prime minister saying Beirut would "tolerate neither tutelage nor diktat" after Tehran voiced opposition to plans to disarm Hezbollah.

The uncharacteristically blunt remarks hinted at a changed balance of power in a country where Iran has long wielded substantial influence by funding and arming Hezbollah.

BEIRUT (Reuters) -No group in Lebanon is permitted to bear arms or rely on foreign backing, President Joseph Aoun told a senior Iranian official on Wednesday, days after the cabinet approved the objectives of a U.S.-backed roadmap to disarm the Iran-aligned Hezbollah group.

During a meeting in Beirut with Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran's top security body, Aoun warned against foreign interference in Lebanon's internal affairs, saying the country was open to cooperation with Iran but only within the bounds of national sovereignty and mutual respect.

MADRID (Reuters) -Spain signalled support on Wednesday for French President Emmanuel Macron's proposal of an international coalition under a United Nations mandate to stabilise Gaza, calling it "one of the tools" that could bring peace to the region.

Macron said on Monday that such a U.N. mission would be tasked with securing the Gaza Strip, protecting civilians and working in support of unspecified Palestinian governance. He said the U.N. Security Council should work on establishing the mission, while France would also work with its partners.