Syrian troops backed by pro-regime militiamen recaptured the Shaer gas field in central Homs Thursday, state television reported, a week after Islamic State group jihadists overran parts of it.

Citing a military source, state television said the forces had recaptured the field and the surrounding area. The report was also confirmed by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group.

A Kurdish female activist was shot dead Thursday on the Syria-Turkey border near the besieged Syrian town of Kobane, allegedly by the Turkish security forces, reports said.

The pro-Kurdish Firat news agency said that Kader Ortakaya, 28, was killed when Turkish security forces opened fire using live ammunition on a protest at the border.

At least 12 civilians, including women and children, were killed on Thursday when Syrian regime helicopters dropped explosive-packed barrel bombs on a district in Aleppo city, a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the attack hit the Muwasalat district of Shaar neighborhood in the rebel-held east of the city.

Syria has asked Russia to speed up delivery of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles, concerned about a possible U.S. attack, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said in an interview published Thursday.

Speaking to Lebanon's Al-Akhbar newspaper, Muallem said Washington had pledged that U.S.-led air strikes against the Islamic State group would not hit the Syrian army.

Seventeen Syrians were charged on Thursday with belonging to an armed terrorist group, reported the National News Agency.

It said that State Commissioner to the Military Court Judge Saqr Saqr charged them with belonging to a terrorist organization in order to carry out attacks in Lebanon.

Turkey is pursuing a delicate but potentially dangerous strategy over the besieged Syrian town of Kobane, working to thwart Kurdish domination of northern Syria but also running the risk of a breakdown of its peace process with the Kurds.

While the United States and the West see the Islamic State jihadists battling Kurds for Kobane as enemy number one, Turkey is equally worried about the risks to its security from separatist Kurdish groups.

General Security chief Abbas Ibrahim stressed the importance of national unity in confronting the dangers facing Lebanon.

He said in an interview with the General Security magazine: “Lebanon will emerge victorious in its existential battle against organized terrorism.”

The Australian Foreign Affairs Ministry issued a travel advice, warning its nationals against heading to several areas in the Lebanon that have witnessed unrest, and saying the situation could deteriorate “quickly.”

The advice, which was issued late on Wednesday, urged nationals not to head to the northern coastal city of Tripoli, areas in north Lebanon, Sir al-Dinniyeh and the northeastern border town of Arsal, citing security fears.

U.S.-led air strikes in Syria hit Al-Qaida-linked militants and an Islamist rebel brigade in a rare expansion of weeks-long raids targeting the Islamic State group, a monitor said Thursday.

American media reported that 24-year-old French bombmaker David Drugeon, a Muslim convert who joined an Al-Qaida offshoot, the Khorasan group, was killed in the overnight strikes.

Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi stressed on Thursday that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and al-Qaida don't exist in Lebanon, ruling out that jihadists established an Islamic "emirate" in northern Lebanon.

“Daesh and al-Qaida don't exist in Lebanon,” Rifi said in an interview published in the Saudi newspaper Okaz, holding Hizbullah responsible for the negative impact of the Syrian crisis on Lebanon after its involvement in the war raging in the neighboring country.