The U.N. Human Rights Council unanimously called Friday for Libya to be suspended from the body and for a probe into violations by the regime, in a dramatic session which witnessed the defection of Tripoli's envoy.

In a resolution adopted by consensus, the 47-member U.N. body decided to "urgently dispatch an independent, international commission of inquiry ... to investigate all alleged violations of international human rights law in Libya."

An embattled Moammar Gadhafi said he would throw open the country's arsenals to his supporters in a rabble rousing speech Friday that presaged a bloody battle for the Libyan capital.

In a brief but chilling address in Tripoli's Green Square, Gadhafi told hundreds of cheering supporters from the top of a building to prepare themselves for a fight.

The head of the Syndicate of Gas Station Owners Sami Brax announced on Friday that gasoline will be provided to all stations starting on Saturday.

He made the announcement after holding talks with Caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel berated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for failing to advance peace talks during a "tense" phone call, Israeli daily Haaretz reported on Friday.

Citing German sources, the newspaper said Merkel responded furiously when Netanyahu criticized Germany for supporting a Palestinian-drafted United Nations Security Council resolution against Israeli settlement construction.

Loyalists of Moammar Gadhafi killed several people in shooting that was spreading through Tripoli on Friday as French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the embattled Libyan leader "must go."

And as protesters against Gadhafi's iron-fisted four-decade rule braved deadly gunfire in several parts of the capital, opponents braced for a fightback by a regime that has suffered yet more defections.

Prime Minister-designate Najib Miqati stressed on Friday that he is seeking to form a government that would rise up to the expectations of all the Lebanese.

He said during a popular gathering in the northern city of Tripoli: "We ask for forgiveness over the delay in the Cabinet formation because we want to establish a government that works for the whole of Lebanon."

Lebanon's Shiites are hoping that the revolt in Libya may shed light on the fate of their revered spiritual leader Moussa al-Sadr, whose 1978 disappearance soured relations between the two countries.

"We have long been waiting for Moammer Gadhafi the tyrant to fall or be killed in the hope of knowing what happened to our Imam," said Hussein Maana, 51, a resident of the southern Lebanese village of Maaraka, the hometown of Sadr's family.

New Zealand warned frantic relatives to brace for the worst Friday as toiling rescuers failed to find any more survivors after a devastating earthquake left at least 113 dead.

As rain hampered the painstaking search of the wreckage in Christchurch's city center, Foreign Minister Murray McCully admitted: "The rescue focus is drawing towards a conclusion."

Protesters took to the streets across Iraq on Friday to mark a "Day of Rage,” with thousands flooding Baghdad's Tahrir Square as seven protesters died in clashes with police in two northern cities.

Protesters in the capital were forced to walk to the rally site as security forces imposed a vehicle ban, a day after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki claimed the demonstrations were being organized by al-Qaida insurgents and loyalists of deposed dictator Saddam Hussein.

The deputy to Osama bin Laden issued al-Qaida's second message since the Egyptian uprising, accusing the nation's Christian leadership of inciting interfaith tensions and denying that the terror network was behind last month's bombing of a Coptic church in Alexandria that killed 21 and sparked protests.

The message Friday from Ayman al-Zawahri, the No. 2 leader of the terror network, comes amid renewed Muslim-Christian tension over the slaying of a Coptic priest and a dispute involving a monastery.