Thousands of Palestinians on Wednesday were gathering across the West Bank for rallies in support of the campaign to join the United Nations as the 194th member state.

In Ramallah, the political capital of the West Bank, thousands of people were heading for the city Centre, waving flags and chanting slogans, for a rally expected to start late morning, an AFP correspondent said.

Libya's new rulers said on Wednesday that their fighters have overrun the key southern city of Sabha, one of the last strongholds of forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi.

"We are in complete control of the city of Sabha. Everybody, including (those who were) pro-Gadhafi, are now with the revolution," Abdelmajid Seif Ennasr, an official for the National Transitional Council in Sabha, told Agence France Presse.

The United States is building an array of secret new drone bases to conduct strikes against al-Qaida targets in Somalia and Yemen, according to the Washington Post.

One of the new installations is being set up in Ethiopia, a close U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamist Shebab that controls much of Somalia, while another is being established in the Seychelles, the Post reported late Tuesday.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Tuesday said that for progress to be made in the thorny clash at the United Nations over Palestinian statehood, both sides will have to give.

"It's up to us, and mainly to our counterpart, the Palestinian leadership, Mahmud Abbas, and to others, to show the leadership and start to move," Barak told CNN television.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan Tuesday discussed the need to "increase pressure" on the Syrian regime to aid the pro-democracy protests.

The two leaders "talked about the need to increase pressure on the Assad regime, in order to lead to an outcome that is responsive to the aspirations of the Syrian people," a White House official said.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday that he isn’t after a “confrontation” with the United States or any other country over a bid for U.N. membership of a Palestinian state.

“The Palestinian people have the right to have a recognized state in the international community. This is our right,” Abbas told An Nahar.

U.S. President Barack Obama on Tuesday called on Turkey and Israel to repair their ties strained by a crisis over a deadly 2010 flotilla raid.

"The president underscored his interest in seeing a resolution of that issue between those two countries who are both allies of ours, and encouraged them to work towards that end," said a top White House advisor said.

Libya's interim leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil told U.S. President Barack Obama Tuesday that fugitive former leader Moammar Gadhafi was still in the country, a U.S. official said.

"Chairman Jalil ... said that he believes that Gadhafi is still in Libya," said Derek Chollet, senior director for strategic planning on the National Security Council, after the two leaders met at the United Nations.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Tuesday urged the Libyan people who have been fighting a bitter conflict against Moammar Gadhafi to "have the courage to forgive."

He told a meeting at the United Nations on Libya, attended by the country's transitional leaders, that Kadhafi would eventually be tried once the fighting had stopped.

Syrian security forces killed six civilians on Tuesday during a raid on anti-government protesters amid reports the United States expects the fall of President Bashar Assad and more violence after.

Meanwhile, an activist group inside Syria announced its backing for a recently named National Council of opposition figures, underscoring the need for unity in the campaign to overthrow the regime.