International Top Stories from Associated Press (AP)

BEIRUT (AP) , A car bomb ripped through Beirut on Friday, killing a top security official and seven others, shearing the balconies off apartment buildings and sending bloodied residents staggering into the streets in the most serious blast the Lebanese capital has seen in four years.

BEIRUT (AP) , Turkey and Germany on Friday threw their weight behind calls for a Syrian cease-fire during a Muslim holiday next week as the international envoy for the conflict arrived in Damascus to push for the plan.

PARIS (AP) , Twitter agreed to pull racist and anti-Semitic tweets under a pair of French hash tags after a Jewish group threatened to sue the social network for running afoul of national laws against hate speech, the organization said. The decision came a day after Twitter bowed to German law and blocked an account of a banned neo-Nazi group there.

A former FBI agent was among three persons named in a federal grand jury indictment handed up Friday in Salt Lake City in a scheme to use the agent's official position to derail a federal investigation in exchange for a $200,000 cash payment.

MADRID (AP) , Spain is considering a ban on photographing, filming or reproducing images of police and state security forces who are on duty, officials said Friday. Interior Minister Jorge Fernandez Diaz said the government is considering prohibiting the capture, playback and processing of images, sounds or data of security forces while "in the exercise of their functions."

ROTTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) , Police hunting for the thieves who broke into a Rotterdam art gallery and snatched seven paintings worth millions are releasing security camera footage of the heist in a bid to gather more tips. But don't expect to see the thieves' faces.