Speaker Nabih Berri scheduled on Thursday a parliamentary session for November 5, which media reports suggested will be used to extend the parliament's term.

The National News Agency said that Wednesday's session will be aimed at studying and approving draft-laws.

The army said on Thursday that it has arrested a Lebanese man who admitted to smuggling arms to jihadists taking position on the Lebanese-Syrian border as the military rounded up dozens in its clampdown on militants.

Abdullah Mahmoud al-Hujairi was apprehended in the area of Wadi Hmeid in the northeastern border town of Arsal, said an army communique.

Gunmen, who engaged in deadly battles with the Lebanese army in the northern coastal city of Tripoli and in Akkar over the weekend, deserted their positions and fled the scene after they realized that they will not be able to stand firm against the army, As Safir newspaper reported on Thursday.

According to the daily, gunmen linked to fugitives Shadi al-Mwalawi and Ousama Mansour in Tripoli's al-Tabbaneh neighborhood decided to leave their position after Mawlawi posted a voice record accusing Muslim scholars of “abandoning them.”

Hizbullah is more dangerous than militant groups operating in the Gaza Strip, an Israeli army general said, expressing belief that the party has dug tunnels across the border from Lebanon in preparation for any future war with the Jewish State.

As a result of the greater threat from Hizbullah and in the event of a future conflict, the Israeli army will have to take “many more decisive acts and employ much more power” than it did in Gaza, Maj.-Gen. Yair Golan, commander of Israeli forces on the Lebanese and Syrian fronts, told Army Radio on Wednesday.

U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly ruled out the naturalization of Syrian refugees, denying international pressure to keep the displaced in Lebanon.

In remarks to As Safir daily published on Thursday, Plumbly said: “The issue of the naturalization of the Syrian refugees is out of the question.”

Armed clashes broke out on Wednesday evening on the Lebanese-Syrian border outside the Bekaa towns of Deir al-Ghazal and Qusaya, in an area that has been witnessing near-daily skirmishes with Syria-based militants.

“Clashes are underway in the outskirts of the towns of Deir al-Ghazal and Qusaya on Syria's border,” Lebanon's National News Agency reported.

The families of the captive troops and policemen burned tires on Wednesday evening at the Riad al-Solh Square in downtown Beirut over perceived “procrastination” in negotiations to free their loved ones, despite reports of a meeting between Qatar's mediator and al-Nusra Front.

“Relatives of hostage servicemen set tires ablaze in Riad al-Solh over reports of procrastination in the negotiations,” Voice of Lebanon radio (93.3) said.

The Israeli army on Wednesday carried out a live ammunition maneuver in the occupied Shebaa Farms, Lebanon's National News Agency said.

“The Israeli army has been conducting a live ammo drill inside the occupied Shebaa Farms since 5:00 pm,” NNA reported in the evening.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi renewed on Wednesday his sharp criticism over the political forces' failure to elect a president for the country, rejecting any talk of trilateral power-sharing between the major sects.

“There is talk nowadays about a constituent assembly and we reject from this moment any debate over trilateral power-sharing … because that would be a violation of the (1943 National) Pact,” said al-Rahi during a dinner hosted by the Maronite parish in the Australian city of Adelaide.

Army chief General Jean Qahwaji on Wednesday reassured “there will be no bargaining at the expense of the blood of the martyrs” who fell in the northern regions of Tripoli and Minieh, stressing that the fugitive gunmen will be arrested “no matter how long it takes.”

“The martyrs and the injured soldiers' blood will not go in vain," said Qahwaji during a visit to the Aley district, where he offered condolences to the families of slain officers Jihad al-Habr and Firas al-Hakim, who were killed in the latest clashes in the North.