Pope Francis canceled a planned July trip to Africa on doctors' orders because of ongoing knee problems, the Vatican said Friday, raising further questions about the health and mobility problems of the 85-year-old pontiff.

The Vatican said the July 2-7 trip to Congo and South Sudan would be rescheduled "to a later date to be determined."

Tens of thousands of people attended this year's Pride Parade in Tel Aviv on Friday, celebrating the LGBTQ community and calling for equality in the largest annual gathering of its kind in the Middle East.

The sprawling event in Israel's seaside metropolis, which resembles a festive block party, returned last year after pandemic restrictions were mostly lifted. This year it is being held after Israel reopened to foreign tourists.

In a 500-year-old stone theatre in the Egyptian capital, two young dervishes spin ceaselessly. Slowly, then all at once, they are consumed in a flurry of vivid fabrics.

Born into a lineage of whirling dervishes, Mohamed Adel, 20, takes great pride in the uniquely Egyptian interpretation of the centuries-old ritual known colloquially as "tanoura", or skirt in Arabic.

Academy Award–winning actor Matthew McConaughey has made an appearance at the White House to call on Congress to "reach a higher ground" and pass gun control legislation in honor of the children and teachers killed in last month's shooting rampage at an elementary school in his hometown of Uvalde, Texas.

In a highly personal 22-minute speech, McConaughey exhorted a gridlocked Congress to pass gun reforms that can save lives without infringing on Second Amendment rights.

Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles and dozens of other women who say they were sexually assaulted by Larry Nassar are seeking more than $1 billion from the FBI for failing to stop the now convicted sports doctor when the agency first received allegations against him, lawyers said Wednesday.

There's no dispute that FBI agents in 2015 knew that Nassar was accused of assaulting gymnasts, but they failed to act, leaving him free to continue to target young women and girls for more than a year.

An Iraqi court on Monday sentenced a British retiree to 15 years' prison for trying to smuggle antiquities out of the country, but acquitted his German co-accused.

The maximum penalty for the offence is death by hanging but the court decided on a lesser sentence for James Fitton, 66, "because of the advanced age of the accused," the judge said.

A Kuwaiti supermarket pulled Indian products from its shelves and Iran became the latest Middle Eastern country to summon the Indian ambassador as a row grew on Monday over a ruling party official's remarks about the Prophet Mohammed.

Workers at the Al-Ardiya Co-Operative Society store piled Indian tea and other products into trolleys in a protest against comments denounced as "Islamophobic".

Thousands of people have attended the annual Jerusalem Pride Parade amid heavy protection by Israeli police, who arrested three people suspected of threatening the event.

Past years have seen religious radicals attack participants. Jerusalem is home to a large ultra-Orthodox Jewish community and other conservative religious groups, and many residents oppose the event.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has sent a letter to the United Nations formally requesting that his country be referred to as "Türkiye," the state-run news agency reported. The move is seen as part of a push by Ankara to rebrand the country and dissociate its name from the bird, turkey, and some negative connotations that are associated with it.

Anadolu Agency said Stephane Dujarric, spokesman to U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, confirmed receipt of the letter late on Wednesday. The agency quoted Dujarric as saying that the name change had become effective "from the moment" the letter was received.

Afghanistan's Taliban rulers have begun a campaign to eradicate poppy cultivation, aiming to wipe out the country's massive production of opium and heroin, even as farmers fear their livelihoods will be ruined at a time of growing poverty.

On a recent day in Washir district in southern Helmand province, armed Taliban fighters stood guard as a tractor tore up a field of poppies. The field's owner stood nearby, watching.