Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi criticized on Thursday the political authority in Lebanon for failing to approve a new parliamentary electoral law, reported the National News Agency.

He said before a delegation from the Bekaa city of Zahleh: “It is shameful that the politicians have been incapable of reaching an agreement over a new law.”

Furious combat raged around the main airport and a military airbase in northern Syria on Thursday, a day after the United Nations gave a staggering toll of 60,000 dead in the 21-month civil war.

Insurgents besieged troops on the perimeter of Aleppo's international airport and around Taftanaz airbase in Idlib province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The Syrian regime has distanced itself from President Michel Suleiman over his indirect criticism of the Syrian ambassador for using the foreign ministry as a launchpad of verbal attacks against Lebanese officials, pan-Arab daily al-Hayat reported on Thursday.

The newspaper quoted official Lebanese sources as saying that Damascus has expressed frustration over Suleiman's recent comments that diplomats should abide by the protocol and the foreign ministry should reject being used as a forum for accusations launched against political leaderships.

The cabinet on Thursday voted to adopt a three-part plan to tackle the influx of refugees from war-torn Syria, amid the objection of the ministers of the Change and Reform bloc, who called for shutting the border with the neighboring country.

Radio Voice of Lebanon (100.5) said the three-part plan involves “registration -- which means the counting of refugees -- medical and food aid, and the security and social consequences.”

More than 60,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict, the U.N. said on Wednesday, as dozens more died or were injured when a service station near Damascus was hit by an air strike.

As the casualties continued to mount, the family of a freelance U.S. journalist, who contributed videos to AFP, revealed that he was kidnapped in Syria six weeks ago and has been missing ever since.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati warned on Wednesday of the negative impact of linking the case of Syrian refugees in Lebanon to local political disputes.

He said: “Targeting any ministry or official Lebanese agency over their handling of the issue is unjustified and unacceptable.”

Jordanian riot police fired tear gas on Wednesday to disperse Syrian refugees at a northern desert camp after they clashed over blankets distributed by a local charity, an official and a witness said.

"The Jordan Hashemite Charity Organization was giving away 2,000 blankets at the Zaatari camp. Some refugees tried to grab more blankets, angering other Syrians and clashes broke out," Anmar Hmud, a government spokesman for refugee affairs, told Agence France Presse.

A freelance American reporter who contributed videos to Agence France-Presse (AFP) in recent months was kidnapped in war-torn Syria six weeks ago and has been missing since, his family revealed Wednesday.

U.S. journalist James Foley, 39, an experienced war reporter who has covered other conflicts, was seized by armed men in the northern province of Idlib on November 22, according to witnesses.

General Security chief Abbas Ibrahim predicted on Wednesday that the crisis in Syria would last “a long time,” reported Voice of Lebanon radio (100.5).

He added: “The humanitarian condition of the refugees arriving in Lebanon from Syria prevents us from closing the border with the neighboring country.”

An air raid on a town partly held by rebels on the outskirts of Damascus on Wednesday killed at least 12 members of the same family, most of them children, a watchdog said.

Regime warplanes bombed the town of Moadamiyet al-Sham, southwest of the capital, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.