The Philippines Wednesday said it would keep its peacekeepers in the Golan Heights until at least August, and may stay longer if the United Nations increased security there.

The announcement by Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario followed repeated government warnings in recent weeks that it was considering swiftly pulling out its 341 soldiers from the volatile area between Syria and Israel.

U.S. plans to arm Syrian rebels have raised fears in Israel that the weapons could fall into the wrong hands, but analysts played down the threat -- provided no big guns are involved.

Washington said last week that it would provide Syria's rebels with military support in the form of small arms after it determined that the Syrian regime had used chemical weapons.

Fighters from Hizbullah joined Syrian troops battling rebels near Damascus on Wednesday, monitors said, as President Bashar Assad's regime kept up a push to cut off the insurgents' supply lines.

"Army troops and Hizbullah members fought rebels near the Khomeini hospital in Zayabiyeh village," southeast of Damascus, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

A group of 30 Egyptians and Emiratis have been charged by the UAE authorities for allegedly setting up an illegal branch of Egypt's Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, a prosecutor said on Wednesday.

The suspects have been referred to the Gulf nation's State Security Court, prosecutor Ahmed al-Dhanhani said.

Oscar-winning actress Angelina Jolie urged the international community to boost aid to Syrian refugees hit by what she called "the worst humanitarian crisis of the 21st century," a UNHCR statement said Wednesday.

Jolie, who is UNHCR special envoy for refugee affairs, visited the Jordan-Syria border overnight accompanied by head of U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres.

An explosion at a military depot outside Syria's coastal city of Latakia left six people lightly injured on Wednesday, state television said.

State TV said a "technical error" caused the explosion at a base used by the army corps of engineers. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a number of activists on the ground, said it did not know the cause of the explosion in what it described as an ammunition warehouse. It said 13 people were injured, including some in critical condition.

A suicide bombing in northern Iraq on Wednesday killed the leader of a provincial political party and four relatives, officials said, on the eve of elections his bloc was to participate in.

Yunus al-Ramah, head of the United Iraq party, had been hosting a social gathering at his home in the town of Al-Hadhr, in Nineveh province, when the attack took place, according to security and medical officials.

Syria's main opposition bloc said Wednesday it will fight on to topple President Bashar Assad, and that any political solution to the conflict must lead to the fall of the regime.

The National Coalition's statement comes after G8 leaders said they were "committed to achieving a political solution" to the Syrian conflict.

Time is running out for the Middle East peace process, which must move forward or face total failure, former British prime minister Tony Blair said on Wednesday.

"The window of opportunity will be open for only a short space of time," he said, speaking in Jerusalem at the 2013 Presidential Conference, hosted by Israeli President Shimon Peres.

A suicide attack on Wednesday rocked a local market in Yemen's mainly-Shiite city of Saada killing two civilians, a Zaidi Ansarullah rebel told Agence France Presse.

The attacker detonated a bomb-laden motorbike in the middle of the market, said the rebel, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The blast left another 11 people critically wounded, he added.