Two Swedish journalists released after being held for six weeks in Syria said Thursday they survived partly thanks to special training they had received on reporting in a war zone.

"I want to thank the Swedish Armed Forces survival school," reporter Magnus Falkehed said at a press conference held shortly after landing in Stockholm with photographer Niclas Hammarstroem.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Thursday a Syrian peace conference planned for later this month will fail if Tehran, Damascus' main regional ally, does not participate, media reported.

The remarks came ahead of a meeting Monday at which Russia and the United States are to discuss Tehran's possible involvement in the talks set to start in Montreux, Switzerland on January 22.

Israel is excavating an archaeological site in the flashpoint West Bank city of Hebron, officials said Thursday, in a move critics say aims to legitimize Jewish settlement in Palestinian territory.

The excavations began on January 5 during U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's 10th visit to the region to push Israel and the Palestinians towards an elusive peace deal.

The trial of a Moroccan whose young housemaid died after suffering severe burns in the resort city of Agadir was postponed on Thursday until January 23 because a key witness was absent.

The 14-year-old girl, identified only as Fatima, died in March after being hospitalized with burns to her face and hands, some of them third degree.

The elusive jihadist who staged a deadly siege of an Algerian gas plant a year ago, Moktar Belmokhtar, has the means to stage a similar attack, a top U.S. general said Thursday.

Belmokhtar was the mastermind behind an assault on a remote gas facility near In Amenas on January 16 last year that left 38 hostages dead, following a three-day siege and rescue attempt.

Egypt extended Thursday by 15 days the detention of three journalists working for Al-Jazeera television network who the authorities accuse of threatening public order, one of their lawyers said.

Australian Peter Greste, the Canadian-Egyptian bureau chief for Jazeera English in Cairo Mohammed Fahmy and producer Baher Mohamed, were arrested on December 29 in a Cairo hotel.

Tortured under Tunisia's ousted dictatorship, Islamist premier Ali Larayedh preached reconciliation during his turbulent 11 months in office but twin political assassinations eventually forced his resignation Thursday.

Larayedh took office last February, after the murder of leftist opposition leader Chokri Belaid by suspected jihadists brought down his Islamist predecessor Hamadi Jebali.

West Bank villagers who beat up a group of Jewish settlers then locked them inside a building were on Thursday hailed by the Palestinian government as acting in "self defense."

"Citizens of Qusra village, who were subjected to numerous assaults by settlers during the past months, acted in self-defense," said government spokesman Ihab Bseiso in a statement.

The health of former Israeli premier Ariel Sharon has worsened over the past hours, hospital officials said on Thursday, describing him as being in "extremely critical" condition.

"Over the past hours, there has been a worsening of the condition of former prime minister Ariel Sharon. His condition is described as extremely critical and his family is at his side all the time," said a statement from Sheba hospital near Tel Aviv where he is being treated.

Syria's opposition National Coalition is facing international pressure to attend a January 22 peace conference in Switzerland, but is in a major crisis over participation, members said Thursday.

The pressure to attend the so-called "Geneva 2" talks comes ahead of a Sunday meeting in Paris of the Friends of Syria, which groups countries that back the uprising against President Bashar Assad.