President Barack Obama said on Thursday he reserved the right to resort to both diplomatic and military options to pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad but insisted that U.S. action alone would not be enough to resolve the Syrian crisis.

Bombs tore through markets in Baghdad and a suicide attacker blew himself up in a mosque in northern Iraq in violence across the country on Thursday that killed at least 25 people and extended a surge in sectarian-tinged bloodshed.

Car bombs struck Shiite neighborhoods of the Iraqi capital and a northern city on Thursday, killing 16 people, while gunmen in Baghdad shot dead the brother of a Sunni lawmaker, officials said.

An al-Qaida-linked cell broken up in Egypt at the weekend planned to bomb the U.S. and French embassies in Cairo, state news agency MENA quoted investigators as saying on Wednesday.

A suicide car bomb targeted a foreign military convoy in Kabul on Thursday, killing 15 people including five Americans in the deadliest attack in the Afghan capital for nearly a year, officials said.

Thousands of Palestinians took to the streets in the West Bank and Gaza on Wednesday to mark the 65th anniversary of their mass displacement during the war that followed Israel's founding in 1948.

Iran held two sets of talks Wednesday aimed at easing tensions over its nuclear program, but prospects for any breakthrough were low ahead of next month's elections in the Islamic republic.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry issued a stern warning Tuesday to Syria's government, warning that new help will be given to opposition forces should President Bashar Assad's regime decide to back out of upcoming negotiations aimed at ending Syria's two-year war.

Russian President Vladimir Putin held talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday that focused on the situation in Syria, amid concerns that Moscow could soon provide Damascus with advanced missiles.

Saudi Arabia has confirmed four new cases of the SARS-like novel coronavirus in its Eastern Province, state media reported late on Monday, citing the health ministry.