Egypt's Islamist President Mohamed Morsi told supporters on Thursday that Egypt was on the path to "freedom and democracy," a day after he assumed sweeping powers that critics said made him a dictator.

"Political stability, social stability and economic stability are what I want and that is what I am working for," he told an Islamist rally outside the presidential palace.

Turkey's request to NATO for Patriot missiles is "a new act of provocation," Syrian state television quoted a foreign ministry official it did not name as saying on Friday.

Turkey turned to its NATO partners earlier this week to request the deployment of surface-to-air Patriot missiles to protect its troubled border with Syria.

The number of Syrian refugees registered in neighboring countries has nearly doubled since the beginning of September to more than 440,000, the U.N. refugee agency said Friday.

"Across the region... the number of Syrian refugees in surrounding countries now stands at 442,256, an increase of more than 213,000 since the beginning of September," UNHCR spokesman Adrian Edwards told reporters in Geneva.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Friday that Moscow has no reason to worry about the Patriot missiles Ankara has asked NATO to deploy on its troubled border with Syria.

"Patriots are strictly a measure of defense, as Russia and other countries already know," Davutoglu told reporters after a meeting with Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib, the head of the newly-formed Syrian National Coalition.

Kurdish fighters have agreed to join forces in a standoff with hundreds of Islamist rebels in northeastern Syria, an activist opposed to President President Bashar Assad said on Friday.

Hundreds of fighters loyal to the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) -- which has close ties to Turkey's rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) -- have been locked in fierce battles with fighters of the jihadist Al-Nusra Front and allied Ghuraba al-Sham group in Ras al-Ain on the border with Turkey.

Iran's influential parliament speaker Ali Larijani met Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus on Friday to discuss a solution to the conflict in his country's key ally, reports said.

The meeting came as Moscow warned Turkey against deploying Patriot missiles on its troubled border with war-torn Syria after Ankara turned to NATO to request the surface-to-air defenses.

Russia on Friday warned any deployment of Patriot missiles by Turkey on its border with Syria may create a temptation to use the weapons and spark a "very serious armed conflict" involving NATO.

"I understand that no one has any intention to see NATO get sucked into the Syrian crisis," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters, reiterating concerns aired by the foreign ministry on Thursday.

A Palestinian was shot dead by Israeli forces near the Gaza border on Friday, the first casualty since the two sides agreed a truce ending their week-long conflict, Palestinian medical sources said.

An Israeli army spokeswoman could not confirm the incident, saying only that "disturbances" had broken out on the Palestinian side of the Gaza border early on Friday, prompting Israeli soldiers to fire warning shots.

Protesters torched Muslim Brotherhood offices on Friday, state media said, as supporters and opponents of President Mohamed Morsi staged rival rallies across Egypt a day after he assumed sweeping powers.

The offices of the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), the Muslim Brotherhood's political arm, were set ablaze in the canal cities of Ismailiya and Port Said, state television said.

China can play a "special role" in the Middle East, a Palestinian envoy said Friday, following eight days of deadly conflict between Israel and militants in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.

Bassam al-Salhi, a representative of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, was speaking after talks in Beijing on efforts to upgrade his people's status at the United Nations and maintain calm in the region.