The "brutality" of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's response to anti-government protesters will lead to the downfall of his regime, according to Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

"I think that Assad is approaching the point where he will lose his internal legitimacy," Barak told Israel's Channel 10 television on Monday night.

Anti-regime protesters called for permanent sit-ins across Syria from Tuesday as the authorities were reported to have arrested more than 1,000 people in their latest crackdown on demonstrations.

"We call on Syrians in all regions to gather from Tuesday evening in all public places to organize sit-ins which will continue day and night," said a Facebook post by the opposition Syrian Revolution 2011 website.

Turkey on Tuesday urged Moammar Gadhafi to "immediately" cede power and leave Libya, in its first public call on the veteran strongman to go.

"We wish that the Libyan leader pulls out from Libya and cedes power immediately -- for himself and for the future of his country -- without causing more bloodshed, tears and destruction," Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters.

EU sanctions being drawn up against Syria over its bloody crackdown on protests should target its president, Bashar al-Assad, France's foreign minister said Tuesday.

Asked whether France wanted Assad to be specifically named in the measures being discussed in Brussels, Alain Juppe told reporters: "France wishes so."

President Michel Suleiman hoped on Tuesday that al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden’s death would help pave the way for comprehensive peace in the Middle East.

He hoped that Israel would be pressured to this end and in order to settle the Palestinian crisis.

The arrival of democracy in Arab countries is the best response to "fanatics", French President Nicolas Sarkozy was quoted as saying Tuesday following the killing of al-Qaida supremo Osama bin Laden.

"We must support the emergence of democracy in Arab countries with all our might," Sarkozy told Wednesday's edition of L'Express news weekly in an interview, highlights of which were published Tuesday.

Palestinian factions gathered in Cairo on Tuesday signed a reconciliation deal that will pave the way for elections within a year and seeks to end the divide between Gaza and the West Bank.

Representatives of 13 factions, including Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party and its rival Hamas, as well as independent political figures, inked the deal following talks with Egyptian officials.

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi has discussed "bilateral ties" and the Palestinian issue with his Egyptian counterpart, Iran's English-language Press TV reported on Tuesday.

Salehi and Nabil al-Arabi discussed "latest developments in bilateral ties" during a telephone conversation on Monday night, in the first direct contact following a thaw in Tehran-Cairo relations, the channel said on its website.

Bahraini authorities have arrested two former MPs from the al-Wefaq Shiite main opposition group, in a continued crackdown on the kingdom's Shiite majority, a member of the organization told Agence France Presse on Tuesday.

Matar Matar and Jawad Fayruz were taken from their homes on Monday evening, former MP Hadi al-Mousawi told AFP.

Ismail Haniya, the head of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip, on Monday condemned the killing of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in a U.S. raid in Pakistan.

"We condemn any killing of a holy warrior or of a Muslim and Arab person and we ask God to bestow his mercy upon him," Haniya said during a meeting with journalists in Gaza.