Extremist fighters claiming to be from an al-Qaida-linked group have blown up a Shiite religious building in the Syrian province of Deir Ezzor, a watchdog said on Sunday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Right said the attack occurred on Friday in the eastern village of Hatlah, where rebel fighters killed at least 60 Shiites earlier in the week.

Egypt's Islamist President Mohammed Morsi on Saturday announced the "definitive" severing of relations with war-torn Syria, which is suffering from more than two years of civil war.

Egypt "decided today to definitively break off relations with the current regime in Syria, to close that regime's embassy in Cairo and to recall Egypt's charge d'affaires" from Damascus, Morsi told thousands of Islamist supporters in a Cairo stadium for a "Support for Syria" rally.

Israel reacted to the election of Iran's new president on Saturday by saying it was supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who decides on nuclear policy, not the president.

"Iran's nuclear program has so far been determined by Khamenei, and not by Iran's president," the foreign ministry said after Hassan Rowhani was elected to succeed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The key opposition Syrian National Coalition urged newly elected Iranian President Hassan Rowhani on Saturday to review his country's support for the Syrian regime.

The "Coalition believes that it is its duty to call on the new president of Iran to rectify the mistakes made by the Iranian leadership," the group said, in reference to Tehran's staunch backing of President Bashar Assad.

A Dutch couple living in Yemen disappeared in Sanaa, police said on Saturday, with press reports saying they had been kidnapped.

"The police commissariat in Sanaa learned on Saturday of the disappearance a few days ago of a Dutchman and his wife," a security official said on condition of anonymity.

British fighter jets escorted an EgyptAir plane bound for New York to a Scottish airport on Saturday after a note was found on board threatening to set it on fire, authorities and eyewitnesses said.

"At around 1420hrs today (1320GMT) an EgyptAir aircraft flying from Cairo to New York was diverted to Prestwick Airport after a suspicious note was discovered on the aircraft," said a statement from Police Scotland.

Moderate cleric Hassan Rowhani was declared Iran's new president on Saturday, the interior minister said, in an outright election victory that ends eight years of conservative grip on the top office.

Rowhani in his statement hailed his election as a "victory of moderation over extremism," media reported.

More than 70 Syrian military officers have defected to the opposition and crossed into Turkey, an official there said on Saturday, as world leaders prepared to discuss the Syrian conflict at the G8 summit.

The defections followed a U.S. decision to give the rebels "military support" after Washington reviewed evidence showing the Syrian regime had used chemical weapons.

Al-Qaida's leader in Iraq has defied orders from the group's global chief, Ayman al-Zawahiri, to break up his claimed union with a jihadist group in Syria, according to an audio message released Saturday.

The purported remarks by Islamic State of Iraq head Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in the message posted on jihadist forums indicate tensions between ISI and al-Qaida's central command.

U.S. President Barack Obama discussed the Syria conflict with European leaders ahead of next week's G8 summit in Northern Ireland, the White House said Saturday.

Obama spoke late Friday with British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Francois Hollande, Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, it said in a statement.