World News Roundup: Biden: Israel agrees to halt military activity over Ramadan, risks losing world support; Japan's new births fall to record low in 2023 as demographic woes deepen and more

Biden, who made his remarks during an appearance on NBC's "Late Night with Seth Meyers," said Israel had committed to make it possible for Palestinians to evacuate from Rafah in Gaza's south before intensifying its campaign there to destroy Hamas. Germany's Scholz rules out Western ground troops for Ukraine German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday ruled out suggestions that European countries and NATO alliance members would send ground troops to Ukraine, a day after French President Emmanuel Macron had raised the prospect that some might do so.

Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

Inside the Democratic rebellion against Biden over the Gaza war

The depth of Democratic Party anger over President Joe Biden's handling of the Gaza war has caught his campaign off guard and could depress support in November's election, according to Reuters interviews with more than a dozen senior party and campaign officials and five dozen voters and activists. The White House had expected Democratic unrest over Gaza to fade as Biden picked up his campaigning against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, the officials said.

Italy's Meloni loses control of Sardinia in election defeat

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suffered her first significant electoral setback since taking office in 2022, results showed on Tuesday, with her rightist bloc losing power on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia. Alessandra Todde, a member of the left-leaning 5-Star Movement who was backed by the Democratic Party (PD), won 45.4% of the vote at Sunday's election, edging out Paolo Truzzu, a candidate handpicked by Meloni, who took 45.0%.

Biden: Israel agrees to halt military activity over Ramadan, risks losing world support

U.S. President Joe Biden said Israel has agreed not to engage in military activities during Ramadan in the Gaza Strip, where it is at war with Hamas militants, and said the Jewish state risked losing support from the rest of the world as Palestinians die in high numbers. Biden, who made his remarks during an appearance on NBC's "Late Night with Seth Meyers," said Israel had committed to make it possible for Palestinians to evacuate from Rafah in Gaza's south before intensifying its campaign there to destroy Hamas.

Germany's Scholz rules out Western ground troops for Ukraine

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday ruled out suggestions that European countries and NATO alliance members would send ground troops to Ukraine, a day after French President Emmanuel Macron had raised the prospect that some might do so. German lawmakers spoke out against the idea, which Macron floated at a hastily arranged meeting of European leaders in Paris on Monday. The Kremlin warned it would mark a major escalation.

Exclusive-Hamas studies Paris truce proposal involving 40-day pause and hostage exchange, source says

Palestinian Islamist group Hamas has received a draft proposal from Gaza truce talks in Paris which includes a 40-day pause in all military operations and the exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages at a ratio of 10 to one, a senior source close to the talks told Reuters on Tuesday. Under the proposed ceasefire, hospitals and bakeries in Gaza would be repaired, 500 aid trucks would enter into the strip each day and thousands of tents and caravans would be delivered to house the displaced, the source said.

Yellen: Moves to unlock value of frozen Russian assets 'necessary and urgent'

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Tuesday it was "necessary and urgent" to find ways to unlock the value of $285 billion in immobilized Russian sovereign assets to aid Ukraine, saying it would incentivize Moscow to negotiate a just peace in the war. Washington and its Group of Seven allies have been at odds over what to do with the Russian assets frozen by the U.S., the European Union, Japan and Canada in 2022 to help Ukraine, which faces an estimated cost of some $486 billion to rebuild and recover. Some European countries fear that any seizure of Russian assets could set a dangerous precedent for the future.

South Korea's Yoon says won't back down over medical reforms as doctors strike

President Yoon Sun Yeol vowed on Tuesday to go ahead with a plan to increase the number of students admitted into medical schools to improve healthcare in South Korea, and said there was no justification for the protests this reform had triggered. More than 9,000 young doctors, or about two-thirds of the total number of physician trainees in South Korea, walked off the job last week because of the plan, saying the healthcare sector was not short of doctors, and the government should address pay and working conditions first.

Kremlin warns of conflict with NATO if alliance troops fight in Ukraine

The Kremlin warned on Tuesday that conflict between Russia and the U.S.-led NATO military alliance would be inevitable if European members of NATO sent troops to fight in Ukraine. The war in Ukraine has triggered the worst crisis in Russia's relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and President Vladimir Putin has previously warned of the dangers of a direct confrontation between NATO and Russia.

Japan's new births fall to record low in 2023 as demographic woes deepen

The number of babies born in Japan fell for an eighth straight year to a fresh record low in 2023, preliminary government data showed on Tuesday, underscoring the daunting task the country faces in trying to stem depopulation. The number of births fell 5.1% from a year earlier to 758,631, while the number of marriages slid 5.9% to 489,281 -- the first time in 90 years the number fell below 500,000 -- foreboding a further decline in the population as out-of-wedlock births are rare in Japan.

Yellen says Israel resuming tax revenue transfers to Palestinian Authority

Israel has agreed to resume transferring tax revenues to the Palestinian Authority to fund basic services and bolster the West Bank economy, and money has begun to flow, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Tuesday. "This must continue," Yellen said in remarks prepared for a news conference, noting that Washington had been urging the Israeli government to release the so-called "clearance revenue" to the Palestinian Authority. She gave no further details.