Russia said Friday it was willing to "set aside differences" with Turkey ahead of talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish officials that will focus on Syria.

"Turkey and Russia have clearly different positions on several questions, notably the Middle East, but these must be put aside when Mr. Putin holds talks in Istanbul," Russian Ambassador Vladimir Ivanovsky told reporters.

Fighting raged around Damascus on Friday as Internet and phone links in Syria remained cut for a second day and rebels consolidated gains in the east, capturing an oil field near the Iraqi border.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the road from the capital to Damascus airport had reopened, a day after fighting during which a bus carrying airport employees was hit by a shell, killing two people.

A senior Iranian official on Friday welcomed the upgrading of the Palestinians' status at the United Nations as a "positive step."

The U.N. General Assembly vote to make Palestine a non-member observer state was "a positive and forward step and proves that the Zionist regime is illegitimate," Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said.

Dutch police have arrested three alleged would-be jihadists who were about to leave The Netherlands to go and fight alongside rebels in Syria, the national Prosecutor's Office said Friday.

"Detectives arrested three men on Thursday who apparently planned to travel to Syria to participate in a violent international jihad," it said in a statement.

Canada on Friday ordered back its heads of mission in Israel and Ramallah, as well as its envoys to the United Nations and Geneva, over Palestine's bid for an upgraded status at the United Nations.

"Canada is deeply disappointed but not surprised by yesterday's result at the United Nations General Assembly," Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said in a statement.

Protesters clashed with police Friday in Tunisia's flashpoint town of Siliana, where violence has left hundreds wounded this week, as political instability mounts two years after the revolution.

Thousands took to the streets of the impoverished town demanding the governor's resignation and financial aid in a fourth straight day of unrest, with the authorities battling to maintain order.

Demonstrators booed the rebel Free Syrian Army on Friday in regions where Islamist fighters have a strong presence, in videos posted on the Internet by activists.

"Free Army, go to the front lines," protesters in Aleppo's eastern district of Shaar shouted, criticizing FSA fighters who stay behind in rebel strongholds.

Israel revealed plans on Friday to build 3,000 settler homes in east Jerusalem and the West Bank in response to the Palestinians' historic success in being recognized as a non-member state at the United Nations.

During the landmark Thursday vote in New York, the U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly backed a resolution recognizing Palestine within the 1967 borders as a non-member observer state.

Gunmen kidnapped on Friday 20 men who were traveling from northern Iraq to Baghdad for medical tests needed to join the army, police and army officers said.

They were seized at Al-Amin restaurant near Baiji, a police lieutenant colonel said, adding that the kidnappers took them in eight vehicles toward Anbar province, which is home home to various former insurgent strongholds.

Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region said on Friday that talks on reducing tensions with the federal government have stalled over the contentious issue of a newly-established northern military command.

Talks between federal and Kurdish security officials reached an impasse over Baghdad's refusal to scrap the Tigris Operations Command, which was "the basic requirement emphasized by the leadership of Kurdistan for normalizing the situation," a statement on the Kurdistan government's website said.