Army Commander General Joseph Aoun on Wednesday inspected military units in the Tufail region and Baalbek's outskirts on Syria's border.

The Syrian Embassy in Beirut on Wednesday deplored alleged abuse of Syrian workers in Lebanon and hailed President Michel Aoun's latest call for avoiding incitement against Syrian refugees.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was caught Wednesday by a live microphone making a rare public admission that Israel has struck Iranian arms convoys in Syria bound for Hizbullah "dozens and dozens of times."

Netanyahu was also heard railing against the European Union's "crazy" insistence on resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a precondition for closer ties with the 28-state bloc, and trumpeting Israel as essential to its prosperity and survival.

The parliament convened in a second legislative session on Wednesday, under the chairmanship of Speaker Nabih Berri, and approved a number of laws that introduced tax provisions that secured revenues to finance the wage scale after it was approved during Tuesday's session.

At the beginning of the meeting, the council approved an amendment to Article 10 which imposes an amount of 5000 Lebanese pounds on non-Lebanese passengers upon their entry into Lebanon.

The Internal Security Forces Intelligence Branch on Wednesday arrested a group of Lebanese young men who appeared in a video posted on social media beating up and shouting xenophobic insults at a young Syrian man, Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq said.

The video, which has sparked outrage on social networking websites, shows the Lebanese men kicking the Syrian man as he sobs and cowers on the ground. They also ask him to curse his country, the jihadist Islamic State group and to repeat slogans supportive of President Michel Aoun, the Lebanese army and Army chief General Joseph Aoun.

Efforts to uncover the fate of Lebanese servicemen abducted by the Islamic State terror group are “ongoing away from media spotlight,” and the “military leadership is doing everything it can” in that regard, al-Joumhouria daily reported on Wednesday.

In an interview to the daily, a security source who spoke on condition of anonymity said: “Let us stop the bidding in the file of hostaged servicemen. The military leadership is doing everything it can and will not hesitate to open any possible channel that could lead to results.”

Civil society activists from the 'We Want Accountability' campaign gathered on Wednesday near the Finance Ministry in a move they said aimed at discouraging the government from imposing new taxes.

The family of a Lebanese man who has been held in Iran for nearly two years said Tuesday his condition is deteriorating three weeks after he went on a hunger strike.

Nizar Zakka, 50, was rushed to a hospital on Sunday, where he refused an IV, his brother Ziad told The Associated Press. He said his brother is prepared to die if he is not released, and refused to sign documents in Farsi, a language he doesn't understand.

Parliament on Tuesday approved the long-awaited new wage scale for civil servants and the armed forces although without a final agreement on the sources of funding.

Speaker Nabih Berri adjourned the legislative session to Wednesday after lawmakers approved the reforms related to the wage scale following the amendment of some articles.

The eighth session of the Association Council of the European Union and Lebanon took place in Brussels on Tuesday.