Hundreds of Palestinians on Monday staged a peaceful protest in Ramallah against an anti-Islam film that has sparked violent demonstrations in the Muslim world.

Participants of the sit-in, organized by the Palestinian Authority's Waqf (religious endowment) and held outside its offices, held signs saying "We are against those who oppose you Mohammed" and "Do not touch our Prophet."

The top U.S. general on Monday discussed the Syrian crisis with officials in Ankara, as Turkey's premier criticized Washington for inaction over the conflict.

General Martin Dempsey's visit is part of an "operational planning" mechanism established between Turkey and the United States to prepare for the aftermath of Syrian President Bashar Assad's embattled regime.

Foreign ministers of the Syria "contact group" were to hold their first high-level meeting on Monday in Cairo, Egypt's Foreign Ministry said.

The top diplomats of "Egypt, Turkey and Iran will meet at the foreign ministry to discuss developments in Syria on the political and humanitarian fronts," the ministry said in a statement.

The U.N. Security Council should refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court, an international rights watchdog said on Monday.

"An ICC referral would give the ICC jurisdiction to investigate crimes committed by both the government and the opposition," Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at New York-based Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

Hundreds of Yemeni students demonstrated on Monday calling for the expulsion of the U.S. ambassador and condemning the deployment of U.S. Marines to protect his embassy, an Agence France Presse correspondent said.

"Leave slave of the devil, leave ambassador of the Americans," chanted the protesters at Sanaa University. "You coward American, the Prophet of God cannot be insulted."

An increasing number of "foreign elements" including jihadis are now operating in Syria, an independent U.N. panel confirmed Monday in its first report to say that outside "terrorists" have joined a war spiraling out of control.

The investigative panel appointed by the Human Rights Council says some of these forces are joining armed anti-government groups while others are operating on their own.

Fighting raged in Syria's second city Aleppo on Monday amid a disputed claim that the army had managed to seize the strategic district of Midan from rebels, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The army clashed with rebel fighters in several districts of the northern city, which has been the site of fierce fighting since July 20, the Observatory said.

The international peace envoy for Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, was to hold talks in Cairo on Monday with Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi following his trip to Damascus, the organisation said on Monday.

"Brahimi will brief Arabi on his visit to Syria and his meeting with Syrian President Bashar Assad and members of the opposition there," an Arab League official said.

The foreign ministers of Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey are to hold their first high-level meeting on the Syria conflict on Monday in Cairo, Iran's official news agency IRNA reported.

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi was also to speak with Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi in a separate bilateral meeting during his visit to Cairo, it added.

A suicide bomber on Monday killed seven people and wounded an MP in an attack at an entrance to Baghdad's heavily secured Green Zone, where the Iraqi government and U.S. embassy are based, officials said.

The attacker drove up to the entrance situated at the July 14 bridge across the Tigris River from the Green Zone before detonating an explosives-rigged vehicle, an interior ministry official said.