Saudi Arabia Saturday urged elderly and chronically ill Muslims not to perform the hajj pilgrimage, to curb the spread of the MERS coronavirus which has killed 38 in the kingdom.

The health ministry issued a set of conditions for people wanting to perform the annual hajj, which this year falls in October, or the year-round omra or minor pilgrimage.

Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun and al-Mustaqbal movement chief ex-PM Saad Hariri have recently had “indirect contacts,” FPM sources confirmed on Saturday.

The sources also confirmed reports about ties between Rabieh and al-Mustaqbal parliamentary bloc chief MP Fouad Saniora.

U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday spoke by phone with Saudi King Abdullah to discuss aid to Syrian opposition forces and to discuss the coup in Egypt, the White House said.

"The President and the King shared their perspectives on the situation in Syria and expressed their strong concerns about the impact of the conflict on the region," a White House statement said.

A Saudi court has sentenced 11 people including foreigners to jail on charges including weapons training, bomb-making and ties to al-Qaida, the SPA state news agency reported Friday.

The prison terms handed down by the special court ranged from 18 months to 15 years, it said, without specifying the number or nationalities of foreigners convicted.

German defense technology group Krauss-Maffei-Wegmann is about to lose a contract worth at least 5.0 billion euros from Saudi Arabia, the daily Handelsblatt reported on Friday.

The Saudis are losing patience over Berlin's foot-dragging on a deal, worth $6.5 billion, to deliver 270 Leopard combat tanks, which is the subject of fierce controversy in Germany, the newspaper said.

A Saudi princess was to be released from U.S. jail on bail Thursday after being charged with enslaving a Kenyan woman, forcing her to work in abusive conditions and withholding her passport.

Meshael Alayban, 42, one of six wives of a grandson of the Saudi King Abdullah, paid a $5 million bond and surrendered her passport, the Orange County, California district attorney's office said in a statement.

Saudi Arabia appears to be targeting regional rivals Iran and Israel with ballistic missiles from a previously undisclosed desert base, a British-based defense analysis group said Thursday.

Satellite images show launch pads with some markings pointed towards potential Iranian targets and others towards possible locations in Israel, IHS Jane's Intelligence Review said.

Qatar, a key supporter of Islamists who rose to power in Arab Spring countries, is losing ground in regional politics to Saudi Arabia which appears to have seized the reins on key issues, notably Egypt and Syria.

The decline in Qatar's regional diplomacy comes as its powerful emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani unexpectedly abdicated in favor of his son Tamim last month.

Saudi Arabia said on Tuesday that it would give Egypt $5 billion (3.9 billion euro) aid to support its economy, six days after the army toppled Islamist president Mohammed Morsi.

The aid, which was decided by King Abdullah, will be made up of a $2 billion interest-free deposit in Egypt's central bank, a $1 billion donation and the equivalent of $2 billion in oil and gas products.

Saudi Arabia threatened on Tuesday to expel non-Muslim expatriates who eat, drink, or smoke in public during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

Ramadan begins in the kingdom on Wednesday.