Syrian regime forces sought Friday to follow up on their victory in the key town of Qusayr near the Lebanon border by sending reinforcements to battle rebels in Homs and the northern province of Aleppo.

Government forces were also trying to mop up final pockets of rebel resistance north of Qusayr, the town which it retook Wednesday bolstered by Hizbullah fighters.

A Sunni Muslim union headed by influential cleric Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi on Friday called for a "Day of Rage and Support" for rebels fighting Syrian regime troops backed by a Shiite axis.

The Association of Muslim Scholars urged its millions of supporters to demonstrate, stage peaceful sit-ins, make speeches and pray for the Syrian rebels on Friday, June 14.

The United Nations on Friday launched a record $5.2-billion aid appeal to fund operations in Syria and neighboring nations, saying the number of people affected by the country's brutal conflict was set to spiral.

The sum by far overshadows the $2.2 billion (1.7 billion euros) the U.N. sought in 2003 to help cope with the crisis sparked by the war in Iraq.

Egypt's President Mohammed Morsi rejected as "absurd" opposition calls for an early election less than a year into his term of office, charging in comments published Friday that such calls violated the constitution.

"We are a country with a constitution and a legal system," the Islamist Morsi said in the interview with leading state-owned daily al-Ahram.

Israel has vowed to re-engage with the U.N. Human Rights Council, six months after it became the first country to boycott a review of its rights record, an official said Friday.

"The president (of the Human Rights Council) received a letter from Israel this week to express the desire to re-engage discussion to come back to the Human Rights Council," the U.N. body's spokesman Rolando Gomez told reporters.

A car bomb in a restive town north of Baghdad on Friday killed six Iranian pilgrims, officials said, the latest in a spike in violence that has sparked fears of all-out sectarian war.

A further 23 worshipers were wounded in the attack, which struck their bus as it was passing through the town of Muqdadiyah en route from the Iranian border to the holy Shiite city of Najaf.

Syrian regime forces Friday sought to mop up the final pockets of rebel resistance north of Qusayr, after retaking the key town that was an insurgent bastion for a year, a watchdog said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said President Bashar Assad's forces were also sending reinforcements to the northern province of Aleppo, where large swathes of territory have been in rebel hands for months.

French President Francois Hollande called on Friday for the immediate release of two French journalists who have gone missing in war-torn Syria.

"I demand that these journalists be freed immediately," Hollande told reporters in Japan, where he is currently on a tour, without mentioning the names or affiliation of those missing.

The U.N. force in the Golan Heights was thrown into disarray Thursday after Austria withdrew its troops and two peacekeepers were injured as Syrian government and rebel fighters battled for a border crossing.

Peacekeepers from the Philippines and India were wounded by mortar shrapnel as the Syrians fought for the strategic crossing, according to diplomats.

The European Union announced Thursday it will give another 400 million euros ($527 million) in humanitarian aid to help Syria and neighbor countries cope with increased refugee numbers as the bloody conflict deepens.

"The Syrian crisis is the most dramatic humanitarian situation in the last decade," European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso said.