A divided Egypt is being called to vote in a referendum Saturday on a new constitution that the secular opposition fears will be used by President Mohamed Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood to usher in an Islamist interpretation of laws.

Protests over the draft charter, and over near-absolute powers that Morsi gave himself for two weeks to push it through, have failed to sway the president from his path.

An Iraqi court has handed down a fifth death sentence on the country's fugitive Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi on a weapons charge, Iraqiya state television reported on Thursday.

The sentence was issued by the Central Criminal Court for possession, transportation and use of silenced weapons, Iraqiya said.

The political struggle over a divisive new constitution for Egypt went into campaign mode on Thursday with Islamists backing President Mohammed Morsi and the opposition urging either support or rejection of the draft charter.

The staggered referendum to decide the text is to begin on Saturday across half of Egypt, including in Cairo and Alexandria. The rest of the country will vote a week later, on December 22.

Pakistan has withdrawn its diplomatic staff from Syria due to deteriorating security in the country, the foreign ministry said Thursday.

"We have temporarily withdrawn our diplomatic staff, including the ambassador, from Syria and they have all returned home," ministry spokesman Moazzam Ahmed Khan told Agence France Presse after his weekly press briefing.

A top Russian diplomat said on Thursday that the regime of President Bashar Assad is losing "more and more" control of Syria after 21 months of conflict and an opposition victory cannot be ruled out.

The comments by Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov appear to be the first time a senior Russian official has explicitly acknowledged that the opposition could defeat Assad and take power in Syria.

Syrian Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim al-Shaar was wounded in a deadly bomb attack targeting his ministry on Wednesday but his condition is not serious, a security source told Agence France Presse.

"He was wounded in the shoulder when the ceiling fell in his office," the source said on Thursday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

At least 24 civilians, including a large number of children, were killed in two separate car bombings southwest of Damascus on Thursday, state media reported.

Eight people, mostly women and children, were killed by a car bomb in the poor Sunni town of Jdaidet Artuz, state television reported.

Israeli border guards shot dead on Wednesday a Palestinian teenager armed with a fake pistol in the West Bank city of Hebron, a police spokeswoman said, adding that clashes broke out after the shooting.

"A young Palestinian man approached a post manned by border guards. One of them asked him for his identity card. The Palestinian attacked him, brandishing a gun that he aimed at the head of the border guard," the spokeswoman said.

Four Libyan policemen were wounded on Wednesday when a bomb exploded in front of their station in the eastern city of Benghazi, security sources said.

"The blast coincided with a traffic police vehicle passing in front of Al-Fwihet station," police officer Adel Jibril told Agence France Presse.

The Syrian regime has begun using missiles and barrel bombs against opposition rebels in the past week or so, a top U.S. official said Wednesday, denouncing the increasing use of "vicious weapons."

Amid reports that Scud missiles have been fired, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said she "was not in a position to confirm types of missiles, simply to say that we're seeing missiles employed now."