Saudi Arabia has arrested a prominent campaigner for women's rights for insulting Islam, activists said on Saturday, accusing authorities of trying to crush all dissent.

Suad al-Shamari, a co-founder of a liberal human rights group, is being held in prison, according to two activists who did not want to be named.

Saudi Arabia stressed Thursday that it was the first country to engage in the fight against terrorism, in an apparent response to recent remarks by Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.

The kingdom was “among the first states that fought terrorism and suffered its attacks,” Saudi National Guard Minister Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah said.

U.S. embassies in the Gulf and Egypt are calling for vigilance after a post on a jihadist website encouraged attacks on American and other international schools there, specifically teachers.

The warnings have been issued by missions in Egypt, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Saudi Arabia beheaded a man Thursday for murdering a fellow tribesman, the interior ministry said, the latest in dozens of executions this year that have alarmed rights campaigners.

Hadi bin Rashid al-Dosari, a Saudi national, was convicted of stabbing to death a fellow tribesman following a dispute, the ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Ali Awadh Asiri slammed on Wednesday statements that would cause contention with regional countries, calling on Lebanese politicians to avoid stances that harm the national interests.

“We urge all sides to be reasonable and avert rifts with nearby countries,” Asiri told reporters after talks with Prime Minister Tammam Salam at the Grand Serail.

The deadly Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) remains a significant threat to Saudi Arabia, the health ministry said on Tuesday after a series of cases in the western city of Taif.

The virus, believed to be transmitted from camels to humans, has infected at least 17 people in Taif since September 5, a ministry statement said.

Saudi Arabia beheaded a Pakistani convicted of heroin smuggling Tuesday, the interior ministry said, bringing to four the number executed in two weeks.

It said a Saudi national was also executed in a separate case, raising to 61 the number of death sentences carried out in the kingdom this year, according to an Agence France Presse tally.

Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said Monday that Saudi Arabia must shoulder a bigger responsibility in the fight against the extremist ideology of the Islamic State group, noting that military efforts alone cannot eradicate the jihadist organization.

“Nowadays, the prime responsibility in the Islamic world for stopping the proliferation of this ideology falls on the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” Nasrallah said in a televised speech.

Three lawyers in Saudi Arabia were jailed Monday for up to eight years and banned from using social media over Tweets that undermined the judiciary, the official news agency SPA said.

The lawyers were convicted, among other charges, of "disobeying the ruler" as well as undermining and slandering the judicial system which they described as "retarded," it said.

Afghanistan's new President Ashraf Ghani performed a pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia and held talks with the oil-rich kingdom's crown prince on his first foreign trip, local media reported Sunday.

Ghani was sworn in last month after a prolonged political stand-off over the results of a fraud-tainted presidential election.