Russia on Friday welcomed the British parliament's rejection of military action against the Syrian regime and warned that such an attack without U.N. approval would deal a major blow to the existing world order.

President Vladimir Putin's chief foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov said the British vote showed growing public understanding of the dangers of an attack against President Bashar Assad's regime.

The U.N. Security Council extended the mandate of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) for another year, with no major operational changes.

In a resolution unanimously adopted, the 15-member body urged all parties to abide by their obligations and respect the safety of the U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon.

France on Thursday sought an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting after a surge of fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, envoys said.

The meeting was called for Thursday after a U.N. peacekeeper was killed in a clash with M23 rebels near the key eastern city of Goma.

Western plans for retaliatory action against Syria for an alleged chemical weapons attack are "difficult to develop", the French government spokeswoman said Thursday.

"The international community must find a riposte that is adapted to the situation," Najat Vallaud-Belkacem said on France 2 television.

Israel warned on Thursday Syria of any attack carried out by Hizbullah against the Jewish state in the coming days to respond to an expected Western attack, saying that is Damascus will be held responsible.

“They cannot play the game that Hizbullah is somehow an independent actor,” the Jerusalem Post quoted an Israeli official as saying.

Peacekeepers came under fire in Sudan's Darfur region while they searched for colleagues missing in a flood, the mission said Thursday, reporting the third attack this month against Blue Helmets.

The attack by "unknown armed men" happened on Tuesday about seven kilometers (four miles) northeast of Misterei, a West Darfur town near the border with Chad, said Rania Abdulrahman, a media officer with the African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur (UNAMID).

A resolution condemning Syria's alleged poison gas use has stalled in the U.N. Security Council due to Russian "intransigence," the United States said Wednesday.

"We see no avenue forward, given continued Russian opposition to any meaningful Council action on Syria," State Department deputy spokeswoman Marie Harf told reporters as Washington and Western allies mull a possible strike on Syria after last week's alleged chemical weapons attack by Syrian regime forces.

Hizbullah stepped up its readiness and raised the level of preparations as the Western warships had entered the Mediterranean Sea, the Kuwaiti al-Rai newspaper reported on Wednesday, pointing out that the party will not standstill and watch the axis of resistance in danger.

High-ranking sources in Hizbullah told the daily that the party's leadership is “closely following up the solo western decision which over-passed the U.N. Security Council.”

 Italy on Tuesday ruled out taking part in any type of military intervention in Syria without U.N. Security Council approval, saying there was no alternative to "a negotiated political solution".

"Italy will not take part in any military solutions without a U.N. Security Council mandate," Foreign Minister Emma Bonino told parliamentarians in Rome.

U.N. inspectors Monday reached a site near Syria's capital of a suspected chemical weapons attack to launch an investigation, meeting doctors and casualties, online videos showed and an activist said.

"The inspectors managed to enter the town of Moadamiyet al-Sham with civilians, and visited the Red Crescent center where they met doctors," Abu Nadim, an activist in Damascus province, told Agence France Presse via Skype.