The Syrian government is reportedly using local militias known as Popular Committees to commit mass killings, U.N. human rights investigators said on Monday. The investigators, who cited accounts from witnesses and victims, also said people were being harassed or arrested by the committees because they came from regions perceived as being supportive of the uprising. But both sides in the conflict have committed violations against civilians, the investigators said.

"In a disturbing and dangerous trend, mass killings allegedly perpetrated by Popular Committees have at times taken on sectarian overtones," the U.N. commission of inquiry on Syria, led by Brazilian Paulo Pinheiro, said in its latest report to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva.

A bipartisan group of senators introduced legislation Wednesday that would sharply toughen U.S. economic sanctions on Iran, The Los Angeles Times reported.

Advocates say the Senate proposal could, at least in theory, block Iran from accessing about one-third of the foreign exchange reserves it relies on to pay for government programs, to finance trade and to prop up its currency.

The United States and its allies already have imposed sanctions on Iran's nuclear and missile programs, its oil and gas industry, insurance and banking, financial sectors and other parts of the economy.

The civil war in Syria is testing Iraq’s fragile society and fledgling democracy, worsening sectarian tensions, pushing Iraq closer to Iran and highlighting security shortcomings just nine months after American forces ended their long and costly occupation here, The New York Times reported Tuesday, September 25. Despite nearly nine years of American military engagement, an effort that continues today with a $19 billion weapons sales program, Iraq’s security is uncertain and its alliance with the theocratic government in Tehran is growing. In response, the United States has tried to secure its interests in Iraq. It has unsuccessfully pressed Iraq to halt flights from Iran that traverse Iraqi airspace to ferry weapons and fighters to the Assad government, and is trying to speed up weapons sales to Iraq to secure it as an ally.

U.S. President Barack Obama's three-day visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories will begin on March 20. Israeli media reports and a Palestinian official have said that it will run from March 20-22 and take in talks with both Israeli and Palestinian leaders in Jerusalem and Ramallah.

According to the official Israeli program released by Prime Minister Netanyahu's office, Obama’s visit will include a trip to the Israel Museum, a speech at the International Convention Centre in Jerusalem and dinners with Israeli president Shimon Peres and prime minister Netanyahu. He will attend a ceremony at Mount Herzl, where he will lay a wreath on the grave of assassinated former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin before heading to Yad Vashem, Israel’s world-renowned Holocaust museum. Additionally, he will visit the site of a U.S.-funded Iron Dome rocket defense system. He will also travel to Ramallah in the West Bank to meet Palestinian Authority officials.

Jordan has taken precautions along its border against the possibility that Syrian authorities may use chemical weapons in their fight against rebel groups, Jordan’s Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour said, Bloomberg reported Wednesday, January 16. “Of course we have to be worried,” Ensour said in an interview. “We cannot take for granted the assertions that Syrian officials are making,” he said, referring to Syrian pledges not to use such weapons to crush the insurgency against President Bashar Assad. Asked whether the U.S., an ally and financial supporter of Jordan, had helped with the preparations, Ensour said that America and other “friendly governments” carried out a training exercise a few months ago. Jordan is one of the main destinations for refugees fleeing the Syrian civil war that began in March 2011. Ensour said there are 293,000 Syrian refugees in Jordan, including 63,000 staying in camps.

Gunmen ambushed the convoy of a Lebanese government minister in the northern city of Tripoli on Friday, January 18, wounding three people and riddling a security patrol car with bullets, Reuters reported. The official, Minister of Sports and Youth Faisal Karami, appeared to be unhurt, medics said. The attack coincided with a weekly protest demanding the release of several Islamists detained in Lebanese prisons. The port city of Tripoli has long been a stronghold of Sunni Islamists in northern Lebanon. But the city has become increasingly volatile in recent months due to the civil war in neighboring Syria, where the Sunni majority is leading a revolt against President Bashar Assad. Supporters of either side have clashed frequently, heightening fears that the war is spilling over into Lebanon.

The Obama administration is providing an additional $100 million for humanitarian aid for displaced Syrians, bringing to $510 million the total U.S. aid commitment since the civil war began more than two years ago, The Los Angeles Times reported.

Israeli and Turkish officials reached a draft agreement to mend the three-year diplomatic crisis between the two countries following a day-long meeting at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem on Monday night.