France said Wednesday it would remain poised to launch military action against Syria over its use of chemical weapons despite ongoing attempts to find a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

The warning came after a meeting between President Francois Hollande, his foreign and defense ministers and senior military figures.

Evidence confirms at least eight massacres have been perpetrated in Syria by President Bashar Assad's regime and supporters and one by rebels over the past year and a half, a U.N. commission said Wednesday.

Calling Syria a battlefield where "massacres are perpetrated with impunity," the U.N. commission investigating human rights abuses in Syria said that in each of the incidents since April 2012 "the intentional mass killing and identity of the perpetrator were confirmed to the commission's evidentiary standards."

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on Wednesday said "a strong response" was needed to the use of chemical weapons and urged Damascus "without delay" to show readiness to destroy them.

Delivering his annual "state of the union" speech before the European Parliament, Barroso said "the use of chemical weapons is a horrendous act that deserves a clear condemnation and a strong answer."

Syrian government troops on Wednesday beat back Islamist rebels and advanced into Maalula, a historic Christian town near Damascus, state news agency SANA reported.

"Units from our heroic army have made major advances, chasing down terrorists from Al-Nusra Front in the town of Maalula," said an official cited by SANA.

Attacks in Iraq killed six people Wednesday, including a school principal who was among several victims in a spate of shootings in the north, officials said.

The latest bloodshed comes as authorities carry out wide-ranging operations targeting militants and implement tight restrictions on vehicle movement in the capital in a bid to combat Iraq's worst violence since 2008.

Twin car bomb blasts on Wednesday targeting Egypt's army killed at least six soldiers in the restive Sinai peninsula, where the military is battling Islamist militants, officials said.

Security officials said an explosion targeted the military intelligence headquarters in Rafah on the border with the Gaza Strip, minutes before a second explosion hit an army checkpoint nearby.

Saudi authorities beheaded on Wednesday a national after he was convicted of murder, the interior ministry said.

Salem bin Hasan al-Essi was found guilty of shooting dead Omar bin Shami al-Shardi, the ministry said in a statement carried by SPA state news agency.

Israel is to pay more than $1 million to the family of an alleged Mossad spy who hanged himself in prison in 2010, the justice ministry has said.

"After negotiations, the two parties (Israel and the family) have reached an agreement whereby the state will pay 4 million shekels ($1.1 million or 842,000 euros) to the family of the deceased," the ministry said in a statement late on Tuesday.

A powerful blast caused serious damage to a foreign ministry building in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi on Wednesday, witnesses said.

The explosion comes on the first anniversary of an attack by militants on the United States consulate in Benghazi, which killed four Americans, including the ambassador.

Iraqi authorities are resorting to desperate measures to quell rising violence, ordering huge numbers of cars off the roads, bulldozing soccer fields and even building a medieval-style moat around one city in an effort to keep car bombs out.

Many Iraqis question the security benefits of the heavy-handed efforts, lampooning them online and complaining that they only add to the daily struggle of living in a country weathering its worst bout of bloodshed in half a decade.