BEIRUT, Dec 5 (Reuters) - Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem on Friday criticised the Lebanese government's decision to send a civilian delegate to the ceasefire committee, calling it a "free concession" to Israel and a clear violation of previous government positions.

On Wednesday, both Israel and Lebanon sent civilian envoys to a military committee monitoring their ceasefire, marking an expansion in the scope of talks between the two nations.

(Reporting by Maya Gebeily and Laila Bassam; Writing by Tala Ramadan; Editing by Sharon Singleton)

Dec 5 (Reuters) - Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said on Friday that ceasefire talks with Israel are primarily aimed at stopping Israeli hostilities on Lebanese territory, after the Israeli prime minister's office said it seeks economic cooperation.

Israel and Lebanon entered a U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement last year, but Israel has not halted strikes against Lebanon's militant Hezbollah group.

Dec 5 (Reuters) - Iran's Revolutionary Guards Navy fired ballistic and cruise missiles at simulated targets in the Gulf on Friday during a two-day military exercise aimed at countering foreign threats, state media reported.

Earlier, Iran hosted an anti-terrorism drill in its northwestern province of East Azerbaijan with members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which, according to state Press TV, was intended to signal both “peace and friendship” to neighbouring states and warn enemies that “any miscalculation would meet a decisive response”.

Dec 5 (Reuters) - Fighting raged in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo on Friday, a day after U.S. President Donald Trump hosted Congolese and Rwandan leaders in Washington to sign new deals aimed at ending years of conflict in a region rich in minerals.

Congo's President Felix Tshisekedi and Rwanda's Paul Kagame on Thursday reaffirmed commitments to a U.S.-brokered deal reached in June to stabilise the vast country and open the way for more Western mining investment.

One year after ousting Bashar al-Assad, Ahmed al-Sharaa has restored Syria's international standing and won sanctions relief.

But analysts warn the former jihadist still needs to secure trust on the home front.

Sectarian bloodshed in the country's Alawite and Druze minority heartlands -- alongside ongoing Israeli military operations -- have shaken Syria as President Sharaa tries to lead the country out of 14 years of war.

ATHENS, Dec 5 (Reuters) - Greek lawmakers approved late on Thursday the purchase of 36 PULS rocket artillery systems from Israel for about 650 million euros ($757.84 million), two officials with knowledge of the issue told Reuters.

Greece has said it will spend about 28 billion euros ($32.66 billion) by 2036 to modernise its armed forces as it emerges from a 2009-2018 debt crisis and tries to keep pace with its historic rival Turkey.

Dec 4 (Reuters) - The U.S. plans to expand the number of countries covered by its travel ban to more than 30, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said on Thursday.

Noem, in an interview on Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle," was asked to confirm whether the administration of President Donald Trump would be increasing the number of countries on the travel ban list to 32.

"I won't be specific on the number, but it's over 30, and the president is continuing to evaluate countries," she said.

As relentless harassment from Israeli settlers drove his brothers from their Bedouin community in the central occupied West Bank, Ahmed Kaabneh remained determined to stay on the land his family had lived on for generations.

But when a handful of young settlers constructed a shack around 100 metres above his home and started intimidating his children, 45-year-old Kaabneh said he had no choice but to flee too.

As with scores of Bedouin communities across the West Bank, the small cluster of wood and metal houses where Kaabneh's father and grandfather had lived now lies empty.

By Nate Raymond

BOSTON, Dec 4 (Reuters) - A federal judge on Thursday said she was "struggling" to understand why President Donald Trump's administration is preventing a Tufts University PhD student who had engaged in pro-Palestinian activism from working on campus nearly seven months after the Turkish citizen was released from an immigration detention center.

By Trevor Hunnicutt

WASHINGTON, Dec 4 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump gathered the leaders of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda to sign a peace deal in Washington on Thursday even as fighting continued in their war-scarred region.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame and Democratic Republic of Congo President Felix Tshisekedi affirmed commitments to an economic integration compact agreed last month, and to a U.S.-brokered peace deal reached in June. They were also due to sign an agreement on critical minerals.