Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi on Thursday condemned a suspected Israeli air strike inside Syria a day earlier, saying in a statement that it violated the territory of a sovereign Arab state.

"This Israeli aggression... is a clear violation of the territory of an Arab state and of its sovereignty, going against the U.N. charter and the rules of international law," Arabi said.

Syria's main opposition chief on Thursday condemned President Bashar Assad's regime for its failure to take action against an Israeli air strike a day earlier.

"Shame on you, O regime of Bashar Assad, that the Israeli warplanes have come and your jets are only focused on destroying mosques and universities, and to kill civilians," Syrian National Coalition chief Moaz al-Khatib said.

Israel's Shin Bet domestic security service and army said on Thursday that some 20 members of Hamas' armed wing have been arrested in the southern West Bank city of Hebron.

The Shin Bet and army arrested "approximately 20 terrorists affiliated with the Hamas who were planning a kidnapping attack in order to bargain for the release of prisoners," a joint statement read.

A Bahraini court on Thursday sentenced a policeman to seven years in jail for torturing to death a protester during a Shiite-led uprising in February 2011, a lawyer said.

"The killer of martyr Ali Musheime was sentenced to seven years in prison, which is the maximum sentence for the charge of beating to death," lawyer Rim Khalaf wrote on her Twitter account.

Al-Qaida's front group called on Iraq's Sunni population on Thursday to take up arms against the Shiite-led authorities and dismissed the country's Sunni ministers as weak and corrupt.

An audio message, purportedly read by Islamic State of Iraq spokesman Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, encouraged the minority community to continue with weeks of demonstrations but said Sunnis would not gain dignity without bloodshed.

Fierce clashes raged on Thursday between soldiers and rebel fighters on the southern outskirts of the Syrian capital as army tanks pounded the area, a monitoring group said.

"Fierce battles pitted troops against rebels on the road linking Damascus to Daraa, in the Qadam district and in Daraya," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists, doctors and lawyers.

British Prime Minister David Cameron flew into the Libyan capital on Thursday for a previously unannounced visit, an Agence France Presse photographer in Tripoli reported.

Cameron, whose visit comes only a few days after Britain warned of threats to its embassy in Tripoli, arrived at Tripoli airport at 11:00 am (10:00 GMT), amid tight security.

Iran's foreign minister on Thursday condemned what he called Israel's "brutal aggression" against Syria, following claims by Damascus that the Jewish state's air force had hit a military research center.

"There is no doubt that this aggression is part of a Western and Zionist strategy to push aside the success of the Syrian people and government to return to stability and security," Ali Akbar Salehi said in a statement.

Israel must immediately stop all settlement activity and start to withdraw its settlers from the Palestinian territories, a United Nations report said on Thursday, drawing anger from the Jewish state.

"Israel must ... cease all settlement activities without preconditions (and) must immediately initiate a process of withdrawal of all settlers" from the occupied territories, a U.N. fact-finding mission concluded.

Rival factions in Egypt on Thursday condemned the violence which has killed dozens in a week of unrest and pledged support for a national dialogue to resolve the political crisis gripping the country.

Top Islamic scholar Grand Imam Ahmed al-Tayyeb chaired talks between liberal opposition heads, Islamists, youth groups, independents and church members at the headquarters of al-Azhar, Sunni Islam's highest seat of learning.