In ramping up its military involvement in Syria's civil war, Russia appears to be betting that the West, horrified by the Islamic State group's spread and an escalating migrants crisis, may be willing to quietly tolerate President Bashar Assad for a while, perhaps as part of a transition.

The logic is that prioritizing the fight with the jihadis means accepting Assad as the less bad option despite his own brutal acts, and might produce a more effective and coordinated fight in the air and on the ground.

Lebanon is expected to participate on Tuesday in a conference of states hosting Syrian refugees in Brussels, the head of the delegation, MP Michel Moussa, said.

Moussa told An Nahar newspaper published on Monday that he will call in his speech for providing Lebanon with promised assistance to confront the refugee crisis and to redistribute the displaced Syrians on countries capable of hosting them.

British Prime Minister David Cameron inspected on Monday Syrian refugees in the eastern town of Terbol and later met with PM Tammam Salam to throw his support behind the Lebanese government.

Cameron said at a joint press conference with Salam at the Grand Serail that the UK will continue to assist Lebanon against the Islamic State extremist group and to provide aid over the refugee crisis.

Seeking to sell his nuclear deal with Iran to a skeptical Israeli public, President Barack Obama has repeatedly declared his deep affection for the Jewish state. But the feelings do not appear to be mutual.

Wide swaths of the Israeli public, particularly supporters of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have little trust in the American leader, considering him naive and even hostile. One recent poll showed less than a tenth considered him "pro-Israel."

The company that managed Hillary Rodham Clinton's private email server says it has no knowledge that the server was "wiped," which could mean that more than 30,000 emails Clinton says she deleted from the device could be recovered, according to a report in The Washington Post.

Clinton has said that personal correspondence sent and received during the four years she was secretary of state were deleted from the server. About as many emails pertaining to administration business have been turned over to the State Department, which is reviewing them and releasing them periodically by court order.

A loud crash startled a California family at home Wednesday morning when a chunk of ice the size of a basketball hurtled from the sky and smashed through the roof, likely the result of frozen moisture breaking loose from an airplane flying high overhead.

Monica Savath said she and her family were in the living room of their Modesto home when they were shaken by the commotion. She said it sounded like a bomb exploding. Running to the attached garage, they found a gaping hole in the roof and shattered ice. Nobody was injured.

An archaeological survey to clear the way for construction near a mall has unearthed thousands of stone tools crafted at least 10,000 years ago.

"We were pretty amazed," archaeologist Robert Kopperl, who led the field investigation, told The Seattle Times (http://goo.gl/bVH7Oq ). "This is the oldest archaeological site in the Puget Sound lowland with stone tools."

Aiming lower saves more lives when it comes to controlling high blood pressure, says a major new study that could spur doctors to more aggressively treat patients over 50.

Patients who got their blood pressure well below today's usually recommended level significantly cut their risk of heart disease and death, the National Institutes of Health announced Friday. The benefit was strong enough that NIH stopped the study about a year early.

"Game Of Thrones" is the Emmy Awards front-runner after winning a leading eight technical achievement awards.

The HBO fantasy saga was honored at Saturday's creative arts Emmys, the precursor to the main Sept. 20 ceremony, in categories including special visual effects and casting.

France's Sebastien Ogier clinched his third World Rally Championship in a row on Sunday by winning Rally Australia for the third year running, taking the 2015 title with three events remaining.

Ogier had a .03-second lead over Northern Ireland's Kris Meeke to begin Sunday's final five stages, and won the opening speed stage by 2.5 seconds.