The United Arab Emirates on Saturday denounced a European Union resolution which criticized the human rights situation in the Gulf country, saying it made unfounded accusations against it.

The resolution was "biased and prejudiced (and) throws accusations haphazardly without substantiating the facts," Foreign Minister Anwar Gargash said in a statement.

Fighting raged across Syria and an air raid struck near Damascus on Saturday after a declared ceasefire for a Muslim holiday fell apart, with at least 175 killed since it was due to take effect.

The truce for the holiday that started Friday conditionally agreed by the regime and the rebel Free Syrian Army (FSA) had raised the prospect of the first real halt to the fighting after 19 months of conflict.

U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi's ceasefire plan to stop fighting in Syria has been a failure, a rebel commander said on Saturday, after almost 150 people reportedly died on the first day of the truce.

"This is a failure for Brahimi. This initiative was dead before it started," Abdel Jabbar al-Okaidi, the head of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) military council in the northern city of Aleppo, told Agence France Presse by telephone.

Attacks mostly targeting Shiite Muslims during the Eid al-Adha holiday killed 23 people across Iraq on Saturday, the country's deadliest day this month.

The shootings and explosions, which also wounded 65 people, were the latest in a spate of violence in the past week that has broken a relative calm, even though authorities had announced moves to boost security during the four-day Eid break.

Almost 150 people died on the first day of a barely-observed truce between the warring parties in Syria, a watchdog said, adding that a fresh clashes on Saturday claimed more lives.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said of the 146 people killed in bombings, artillery fire and fighting on Friday, 53 were civilians, 50 were rebels and 43 were members of President Bashar Assad's forces.

Al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri has urged Egyptians to restart their revolution to press for Islamic law and called on Muslims to kidnap Westerners, the SITE Intelligence Group said Friday.

In a video released on jihadist forums and translated by the U.S. monitoring service, Zawahiri also lashed out at U.S. President Barack Obama, calling him a liar and demanding he admit defeat in Iraq, Afghanistan and North Africa.

Iran's jailed activist Nasrin Sotoudeh who won a European human rights prize on Friday has been on hunger strike and in ailing health in protest at the authorities' refusal to allow face-to-face meetings with her children, Amnesty said.

It said that Sotoudeh, a 47-year-old lawyer, has been on hunger strike for 10 days and was transferred to the medical facility of Tehran's Evin prison on Monday because her health had deteriorated.

Switzerland on Friday adopted new sanctions against Syria, falling into line with decisions taken by the European Union, a statement from the economy ministry in Bern said.

It also took action against two men suspected of links with al-Qaida and the Taliban.

More than 50,000 Muslim worshipers flooded al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City for prayers on Friday, the first day of Eid al-Adha or Feast of Sacrifice, Israeli police said.

"Some 50,000 attended morning prayers on the Temple Mount, and another 7,000 were there for afternoon services," police spokeswoman Luba Samri told Agence France Presse, adding that "everything went peacefully."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will hold talks next week with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on bilateral ties and the crisis in Syria, her spokesman said here on Friday.

Erdogan will arrive in Berlin Tuesday to open a new Turkish embassy building with Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and his German counterpart Guido Westerwelle.