Fierce clashes were reported on the Golan Heights close to the ceasefire line with Israel
Syrian rebels have taken over a UN-run border crossing in the Golan Heights after heavy clashes with regime forces.
Fighting is continuing near Quneitra, close to Israeli-held territory.
The fighting comes a day after Syrian troops - backed by Lebanon's Hezbollah militants - retook the key town of Qusair after a three-week siege.
The battle for Qusair has highlighted Hezbollah's growing role on the Syrian conflict, which has heightened sectarian tensions in the wider region.
The White House called on Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah to withdraw fighters from Syria.
Hezbollah - or the Party of God - is a political and military organisation in Lebanon made up mainly of Shia Muslims. It emerged with financial backing from Iran in the early 1980s and has always been a close ally of Syria's president.
Several rockets landed in the Hezbollah stronghold of Baalbek inside Lebanon late on Wednesday - after rebel threats to strike at Hezbollah on its home turf.
On the international front, France said growing proof of chemical weapons use in Syria "obliges the international community to act".
However, President Francois Hollande cautioned: "We can only act within the framework of international law".
More than 80,000 people have been killed in Syria and more than 1.5 million have fled the country since an uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began in 2011, according to UN estimates.
Heavy shellingWhile the world's attention was focused on the struggle for Qusair, fighting was continuing in most other parts of Syria, especially around the capital Damascus, where regime forces are trying to push the rebels back from the suburbs, says the BBC's Jim Muir in Beirut.
Lyse Doucet: "[The rebels] say they're coming back but they'll come back to a city that's gone"
Israeli army radio and Syrian activists reported that clashes were continuing on Thursday in the Golan Heights, close to the ceasefire line with Israel, which captured part of the plateau in 1967 and later annexed it in a move that has not been recognised by the international community.
"The rebels have seized the crossing near the old city of Quneitra in the occupied Golan Heights," Rami Abdelrahman, head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told Reuters news agency.
Explosions and heavy shelling could be heard in the area.
"The sounds of shelling are very loud," Raya Fakhradin, who lives in nearby Majdal-Shams, told the BBC.
"Everybody is scared. People have been stocking up on food supplies so that they don't need to leave their homes."
Israel has not said which opposition group has taken over the Quneitra border crossing, and there has been no comment from the UN peacekeeping force which normally operates it and patrols the demilitarised zone.
Israeli officials have increasingly voiced fears the civil war in Syria could spill over their borders: They are worried the Golan Heights could be used to launch attacks against Israel, due to the number of Islamist extremists among the rebel forces.
Ghost townQusair lies only 10km (6 miles) from the Lebanese border and is close to important supply routes for both the government and rebels.
This battle for Qusair is over. But now the fight begins to help the people who survived.
Thousands fled the violence, many were trapped inside. Aid agencies speak of alarming reports that large numbers of wounded need urgent care.
There's not enough food or water in Qusair or for those displaced outside in schools, shelters and on the streets. In the last two days, the UN managed to send in a powerful generator to help restart the main pumping station for this entire region.
But now aid agencies are urging the government to give them greater access to the city. The fight for Qusair was a strategic victory, but a humanitarian disaster.
Once home to 30,000 people, a BBC team who were the first Western journalists to reach it after the fighting found it in ruins and deserted but for Syrian and Hezbollah troops.
One of the Hezbollah fighters told The Times newspaper it had dispatched some 1,200 special forces fighters to spearhead the assault on Qusair.
"The buildings were so close, we were clearing them not metre by metre but centimetre by centimetre," said the veteran fighter, who went by the nom-de-guerre Haji Abbas and said he had recently returned from a week's fighting in the town.
"We squashed them into the northern part of the town and then pinned them down with sniper fire."
A large number of rebels had died and many others had surrendered as troops advanced swiftly, Syrian TV reported.
The rebels said they withdrew overnight in the face of a massive assault.
International efforts to resolve Syria's conflict continue, but the US and Russia have failed to set a date for proposed peace talks.
The UN and Arab League envoy to Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, said the international conference might now be held in July, rather than June as had been planned.
He called the lack of agreement between Washington and Moscow "embarrassing", but also noted that neither side in the Syrian conflict was ready to commit to attending.
06 Jun, 2013
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Source: http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNHw8WDCGe6qNLapg0mO93VgKKRIZA&url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-22795655
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