Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani revealed on Friday that Lebanese gunmen have deployed along the Lebanese-Syrian border to prevent refugees “fleeing their country’s massacres” from entering Lebanon.

He therefore demanded during the Friday Muslim prayers from the president, speaker, and prime minister that the border between the two countries be opened to the refugees.

Russia will delay its controversial shipment of three attack helicopters and an air defense system to Syria until security is restored in the country, the Interfax news agency reported on Friday.

"The decision to delay the Syrian delivery timeframe is based on the escalating military and political situation in the country and the act of terror in which several senior Syrian officials were killed and injured," the unnamed military source told the news agency.

Syria's Muslim Brotherhood, a key opponent of President Bashar Assad's regime, announced plans Friday to launch an Islamist political party, saying it was ready for the post-Assad era.

"The decision has been taken to create an Islamic party," the head of the Brotherhood's political wing, Ali Beyanouni, told journalists after the group completed a four-day conference in Istanbul.

Comments by Russia's envoy to Paris that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is ready to give up power in a "civilized manner" are "totally baseless," Syrian state television said on Friday.

"The comments attributed to the Russian ambassador to Paris on the fact that President Assad would agree to relinquish power in a civilized manner are totally baseless," the broadcaster said.

Britain will step up its support for Syria's rebels after Russia and China blocked a U.N. Security Council resolution against Bashar Assad's regime, Foreign Secretary William Hague said Friday.

Hague said Russia in particular would regret its actions, which he said would be harmful to its long-term goals in the region.

Russia on Friday slammed the "unacceptable" Western criticism that followed its decision to block together with China the threat of sanctions against its ally Syria at the U.N. Security Council.

"It is absolutely unacceptable that some Western countries are trying to lay the blame for the escalating Syrian violence on Russia's refusal to support a resolution threatening sanctions against the authorities," foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich told reporters.

More than 300 people were killed in violence across Syria on Thursday, making it the deadliest day of a 16-month uprising against President Bashar Assad's regime, a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a Friday statement that a total of 302 people -- 98 soldiers, 139 civilians and 65 rebels -- were killed across the country, revising an earlier toll.

One more Syrian general crossed into Turkey Thursday, bringing to 21 the number of generals who have fled the unrest in neighboring Syria, a foreign ministry diplomat told Agence France Presse.

"One more Syrian general turned up at the Turkish border, becoming the third high-ranking officer crossing into Turkey over the last three days," said the diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Syrian rebels seized control of the Bab al-Hawa border post with Turkey on Friday after a fierce battle with Syrian troops, an Agence France Presse photographer at the scene reported.

The carcasses of burnt-out lorries were scattered across the scene of the battle. Some 150 armed rebel fighters were in control of the post, which lies opposite Turkey's Cilvegozu border crossing in the southern province of Hatay.

Syrian military forces have routed rebel fighters from the Midan district of Damascus, state television said Friday, but a monitoring group said fighting was still ongoing.

"Our brave army forces have completely cleaned the area of Midan in Damascus of the remaining mercenary terrorists and have reestablished security," the broadcaster said.