Israeli police on Friday limited access to the al-Aqsa and Dome of the Rock mosques in Jerusalem as a precautionary measure a day after clashes in east Jerusalem, a spokeswoman said.

"This Friday we are preventing access to the plaza for Muslim men less than 45 years old," police spokeswoman Luba Samri said, although she denied the restriction was linked to Thursday night's violence.

Time is running out for Syrian President Bashar Assad, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Friday amid reports of anti-regime protests in the country's second city Aleppo.

Clinton, who spoke on a visit to Lithuania, criticized the regime's incoherence in authorizing an opposition meeting and cracking down on political dissent.

U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon welcomed Thursday a move by Bahrain to launch a probe to investigate the violent repression of pro-democracy protests, but stressed its independence was key.

The secretary-general "welcomes this development and underscores that the commission should be granted full access to all individuals, organizations and information relevant to the investigation," his spokesperson said.

Moroccans voted Friday in a referendum on curbing the near absolute powers of King Mohammed VI, who has offered reforms in the wake of protests inspired by pro-democracy uprisings around the Arab world.

Faced with demonstrations modeled on the Arab Spring protests that ousted long-serving leaders in Tunisia and Egypt, Mohammed VI announced the referendum last month to devolve some of his powers to the prime minister and parliament of the north African country.

The U.N. Security Council on Thursday extended the mandate of the U.N. force monitoring the ceasefire in the Golan Heights between Syria and Israel by another six months.

The unanimous decision extends the mandate of the U.N. Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) to December 31, 2011.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Thursday that he plans to visit Syria, facing mounting criticism for its bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, while on a tour of the region.

Davutoglu said that he hoped at the weekend "to leave for a tour of countries in the Middle East which will include Syria," the Anatolia news agency reported.

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood told Agence France Presse on Thursday it was open to contacts with the United States as long as its "values are respected" but said there had been "no direct contacts" in the past.

"We are willing to meet in a context of respect. If the U.S. is truly willing to respect our values and support freedom as it says it does, then we have no problem," spokesman Mahmud Ghozlan said after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said there had been "limited contacts" with the group.

Syrian troops swept into new villages in the northwest on Thursday amid anti-regime protests in the country’s second city Aleppo, activists said.

Around 60 tanks and armored personnel carriers rumbled into two villages in the countryside of Idlib, said Rami Abdul Rahman of the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Britain has given the Libyan rebels 5,000 sets of body armor, as well as police uniforms, high-visibility vests and communications equipment, Foreign Secretary William Hague said Thursday.

He said this was "fully in line" with the U.N. Security Council resolution governing international action on Libya and the arms embargo.

Irish activists on Thursday accused Israel of sabotaging a ship that had been due to join a flotilla to challenge an Israeli blockade of Gaza, forcing the vessel's withdrawal.

The Irish Ship to Gaza (ISG) campaign said it "believes that Israel has questions to answer and must be viewed as the chief suspect in this professional and very calculating act of sabotage".