Qatar is considering buying up to 200 German tanks at a cost of around two billion euros ($2.46 billion), according to a report published on Sunday.

News weekly Spiegel reported that the Qataris were interested in acquiring the Leopard-2 tanks and that a delegation from defense firm Krauss-Maffei Wegmann had already travelled to Qatar to discuss the possible deal.

Two Italian technicians who worked as subcontractors in Syria and went missing for a week in unclear circumstances are on their way back to Italy, the Italian Foreign Ministry said Sunday.

"I am finally sure that they are returning to Italy," Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi said in a statement, following the release late on Friday of the two men, who had been working in Syria for Italian energy group Ansaldo.

A Gulf rights group and a Kuwaiti MP on Sunday criticized the arrest of a member of the Gulf state's ruling family for expressing "political views" deemed offensive.

"Freedom for Sheikh Meshaal al-Malek al-Sabah who was arrested by the state security police," the Gulf Forum for Civil Societies, an organization of liberal activists, said on its Twitter account.

Rebels fighting government forces in Syria's commercial capital Aleppo "will definitely be defeated," Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem said on an unannounced visit to key ally Iran on Sunday.

"We believe that all the anti-Syrian forces have gathered in Aleppo to fight the government... and they will definitely be defeated," he told a joint news conference in Tehran with Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi.

Troops backed by helicopters pushed an offensive against rebels in Syria's commercial capital Aleppo into a second straight day on Sunday, sparking fierce fighting and sending civilians fleeing.

The opposition Syrian National Council (SNC) accused the government of preparing to carry out "massacres" in the northern city and pleaded for heavy weapons to enable rebels to meet the onslaught.

Gunmen shot dead a women, her three daughters and her daughter-in-law in the Iraqi city of Samarra on Saturday evening, security and medical officials said.

The women were killed at a house in Al-Shuhada area of Samarra, north of Baghdad, after iftar, the meal in which Muslims end their daily fast during the holy month of Ramadan, a police lieutenant colonel said.

Syrian authorities Saturday released a Czech woman held since the end of last month on suspicion that she had links with the opposition fighting the Damascus regime, the Czech foreign ministry said.

"Czech national Sandra Bitarova arrested and held in Syria was freed today," spokesman Vit Kolar said. "She is safe and sound, according to the embassy in Damascus."

Panic-stricken civilians crammed inside minivans, on the back of pick-up trucks and inside cars fled on Saturday from strife-torn Syria's second city Aleppo, the word "shelling" on everyone's lips.

Crowds of tired men, scared women and children have been arriving at Atareb, about 30 kilometers west of Aleppo, Syria's commercial hub that is now a key battleground, with regime forces launching an assault on the city.

French President Francois Hollande on Saturday urged the U.N. Security Council to rapidly intervene in the Syria conflict to pre-empt an all-out civil war.

"The role of the countries of the Security Council is to intervene as quickly as possible," he said, specifically addressing Damascus allies Russia and China and warning that failure to do so would mean "chaos and civil war."

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak thanked U.S. President Barack Obama for his decision to reinforce security and military cooperation with the Jewish state, his office said on Saturday.

"Mr. Barak welcomes President Obama's decision to sign a law reinforcing cooperation in defense affairs between America and Israel, including the decision to grant an extra $70 million in aid towards the 'Iron Dome' project," his office said in a statement.