President Barack Obama will meet representatives of the five Middle Eastern nations that supported the first U.S. strikes in Syria later on Tuesday, his spokesman said.

Obama will see the officials from Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar after he arrives in New York for the United Nations General Assembly meetings, White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters on Air Force One.

The United States and its Arab allies unleashed deadly bomb and missile strikes on jihadists in Syria on Tuesday, opening a new front in the battle against the Islamic State group.

Dozens of IS and Al-Qaida militants were reported to have been killed in the raids, which Washington said had partly targeted extremists plotting an "imminent attack" against the West.

Islam has been tarnished by "forces of darkness" and Saudi Arabia should do more to protect its youth from violent extremism, the kingdom's second crown prince said on Monday.

The comments by Crown Prince Moqren bin Abdul Aziz, in a speech for Saudi Arabia's 84th national day Tuesday, come after the kingdom this month agreed with other Arab states to back Washington against Islamic State group jihadists.

Four Saudi men have been sentenced to death for their role in one of the kingdom's "bloodiest terror cells", official SPA news agency has reported.

The agency said late Sunday that a special criminal court in Riyadh jailed "as many as 20" others for between two and 23 years for a variety of crimes.

The Iranian and Saudi foreign ministers met Sunday in New York, with their rival states brought together by their opposition to the Islamic State jihadist group, the Iranian government said.

"This is a new page in relations between the two countries," Iran's Mohammad Javad Zarif said, quoted on the government's website.

Saudi Arabia on Thursday beheaded a Pakistani who attempted to smuggle heroin into the kingdom, the interior ministry said, adding to the more than 50 people executed this year.

"Sanaullah Mohammed Amir was executed in Qatif governorate in Eastern Province today because he tried to smuggle a large quantity of heroin" into the country, said the ministry, quoted by the official Saudi Press Agency.

Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji stressed on Thursday that the military had all the necessary capabilities to engage in tough battles with terrorists in the northeastern border town of Arsal, revealing that the United States and France will provide the institution with further aid.

“We had the essential ammunition to engage in a long and fierce battle with the terrorists,” Qahwaji said in comments published in As Safir newspaper, denying that the army lacked the necessary equipment in the Arsal clashes.

Saudi Arabia's top religious body on Wednesday warned Muslims against joining militant groups, saying their "deviant doctrine" has no place in Islam.

The Council of Senior Ulema, a group of top Muslim scholars, said it was prohibited under Islamic sharia law to join the fighting.

A Syrian convicted of drug trafficking was beheaded in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, the interior ministry said.

Mohammed Ismail al-Jammus had been charged with smuggling a large quantity of amphetamines into the country, a ministry statement reported by state news agency SPA said.

A senior Syrian official on Tuesday criticized the international community for excluding Damascus from recent talks on building a coalition to tackle the Islamic State group.

Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Muqdad, quoted by state news agency SANA, expressed "astonishment" that Syria was not invited to the talks, which were attended by countries that Damascus claims fund "terrorism".