Pope Leo XIV will pray at the site of the 2020 port blast in Beirut that killed over 200 people and compounded Lebanon's economic and political crisis during his first foreign trip as pope next month that will also take him to Turkey to mark an important anniversary with Orthodox Christians.

The Vatican on Monday released the itinerary of Leo's Nov. 27-Dec. 2 trip. It includes several moments for history's first American pope to speak about interfaith and ecumenical relations, as well as the plight of Christians in the Middle East and regional tensions overall.

The Lebanese Forces-led Strong Republic parliamentary bloc has announced its boycott of Tuesday’s legislative session, warning that participation in it would reflect “submission to Speaker Nabih Berri’s hegemony over parliament.”

“It would be a cover-up for a constitutional and ethical crime against hundreds of thousands of Lebanese expats who are facing an attempt to deprive them of their right to contribute to changing the situations through ballot boxes,” the LF bloc said.

The United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, began Monday a visit to Israel as part of her regular consultations with stakeholders key to the implementation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1701 (2006).

Hennis-Plasschaert is set to meet with senior Israeli officials for discussions on recent developments, particularly those related to the implementation of resolution 1701 and the November 2024 Cessation of Hostilities arrangement.

Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil said he sees no problem in having direct negotiations with Israel after Hezbollah "lost its power to defend Lebanon."

Bassil said Hezbollah committed a strategic mistake when it started firing at Israel in support of Gaza and Hamas following the Oct.7 attack and that the group later lost the legitimacy of its weapons when it gave twice a vote of confidence to the government of Nawaf Salam, which vowed to disarm the group.

Egyptian Ambassador to Lebanon Alaa Moussa met Monday in Baabda with President Joseph Aoun on the eve of a visit to the country by a senior Egyptian security delegation.

“The meeting was important and represented a chance to present Egypt’s evaluation of what the region is witnessing, especially after the ceasefire in Gaza and the subsequent developments,” Moussa said.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz visited Lebanon’s border on Sunday with U.S. envoy Morgan Ortagus.

They were accompanied by U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Yechiel Leiter, Israeli Northern Command chief Rafi Milo, and other Israeli army and U.S. Central Command officers.

The Free Patriotic Movement has condemned “the shooting at young Lebanese citizen Elio Abou Hanna at a checkpoint in the Shatila camp, which resulted in his death while he was at the prime of his youth.”

“This was the worst reflection of the chaos of Palestinian arms in camps operating outside Lebanese legitimacy,” the FPM added.

Hezbollah leader Sheikh Naim Qassem has said that the group is ready to resist Israel even if all it has "is a piece of wood".

"When we say we are ready, we mean that we are ready for defense, not to start a war or initiate it. But if a battle is imposed on us, even if all we have is a piece of wood, we will not allow the Israelis to pass," he said Sunday in an interview with al-Manar, adding that "resistance is a reaction not an action."

The head of Hezbollah’s Loyalty to Resistance bloc, MP Mohammad Raad, has stressed “the need for some in Lebanon to realize that the enemy’s goal is to swallow Lebanon, including them, and that it is creating an excuse after another to achieve this objective.”

“All Lebanese must unify their stance to prevent the enemy from achieving its goals, especially that the most important thing blocking aggravated Zionist aggression is the unity of the Lebanese stance and the coherence of Lebanon’s domestic front,” Raad added.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that Israel would seek no approval to strike targets in Lebanon or Gaza, despite agreeing to ceasefires.

"Israel is an independent state. We will defend ourselves by our own means and we will continue to determine our fate," Netanyahu told a meeting of government ministers Sunday.