President Shimon Peres on Thursday distanced himself from the Israeli premier's comparison between the Holocaust and the threat posed by Iran's nuclear program.

"It's not the same thing," Peres told the Ynet website of Yediot Aharonot newspaper in an interview for Israel's Independence Day.

Syria's main opposition group on Thursday called for an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting as it accused regime forces of killing more than 100 people in the central city of Hama in recent days.

"We are calling for an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council so that it can issue a resolution to protect civilians in Syria," the Syrian National Council said in a statement.

Powerful Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr will meet Kurdistan chief Massoud Barzani Thursday in a bid to resolve a crisis between the autonomous region and Baghdad, the cleric's spokesman said.

"An invitation has been sent to the sayyed (Sadr) for this visit, and he responded by saying 'yes,'" Sadr's spokesman Salah al-Obeidi told a news conference in Baghdad when asked about a potential visit by the cleric to the Kurdistan region in north Iraq.

Russia on Thursday joined the United States and the European Union in expressing concern over Israel's decision to legalize three settler outposts in West Bank.

"Moscow is treating this information with serious concern," the foreign ministry said in a statement, noting that the move in the occupied Palestinian territory "affects the chances" of new talks being held by the two sides.

Syrian government troops pressed a campaign to crush regime opponents in several areas on Thursday, activists said.

Two weeks into the truce, at least two people were killed in the town of Maree, near the northern city of Aleppo, and one man died in the village of Mohsen, northeastern Deir Ezzor province, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

U.N. leader Ban Ki-moon has raised concerns over a Bahraini opposition activist who is on hunger strike in prison amid fears about his deteriorating health.

Ban is worried about clashes between security forces and demonstrators in Bahrain and the case of Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, who started refusing food on February 8, his office said in a statement released late Tuesday.

The United Nations on Friday will name Major General Robert Mood to head the Syria ceasefire observer mission that is struggling to get monitors into the country, diplomats said.

U.N. member states have so far offered only 100 military officers for the unarmed force given the risky mission of checking a cessation of hostilities that has barely held in Syria since April 12. A total of 300 observers has been proposed, accompanied by about 90 civilian support staff and experts.

Libya's interim prime minister accused the ruling National Transitional Council on Wednesday of hindering his government's efforts to hold elections for a constituent assembly on time.

"In this historic moment, we find ourselves shackled by members of the National Transitional Council (NTC), who continue to attack the government and threaten to cast a no confidence vote," Abdel Rahman al-Kib said.

Detained Syrian human rights activist and journalist Mazen Darwish is suffering from a "worsening health condition," the Syrian Journalists Union said in a statement on Wednesday.

Darwish, who heads the Syrian Center for Media Freedom and Expression, has been held in solitary confinement by Air Force intelligence since his detention on February 16, the statement added.

Kurdish rebels have killed four members of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards in the country's west, a provincial official told the Mehr news agency on Wednesday.

The attack was carried out by members of the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) near the town of Paveh in Iran's Kermanshah province on Tuesday evening, Mehr reported.