An Iraqi court has rejected a request to send a Hizbullah commander to the United States for trial, a decision that likely ends the Obama administration's push to prosecute the Lebanese man held in Iraq for the 2007 killings of five American soldiers.

The U.S. believes Ali Mussa Daqduq is a top threat to Americans in the Middle East, and had asked Baghdad to extradite him even before two Iraqi courts found him not guilty of masterminding the 2007 raid on an American military base in the holy Shiite city of Karbala.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati on Thursday called on the ruling coalition and the opposition to contribute to devising a national defense strategy that would “protect the country’s unity and defend it against the domestic and external threats.”

Defending his government’s so-called “self-disassociation policy” towards the Syrian crisis, Miqati described it as “the correct choice to spare Lebanon the inferno of regional conflicts and to preserve our country in this troubled period.”

The EDL contract workers committee on Thursday announced that a meeting will be held with the General Labor Confederation and the political forces that contributed to resolving their problem, noting that “there is a positive atmosphere although some formalities remain pending.”

“We will go home but the sit-in will remain in place until we hold our meeting with the labor minister, the (political) forces concerned and the GLC,” state-run National News Agency quoted the committee as saying.

The cabinet on Thursday approved expenditure aimed at increasing the salaries of public school teachers and meeting the needs of Syrian refugees.

“Among the most prominent decisions was the approval of a draft decree on allocating L.L. 200 billion for boosting the ranks of the teachers' salary scale by four ranks,” Information Minister Walid al-Daouq told reporters after a cabinet session at the Grand Serail.

U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Maura Connelly on Thursday held a meeting with Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun, during which she conveyed “the grave concern of the United States over recent assassination attempts in Lebanon” and said the U.S. was “deeply disturbed by the recent deportations of 14 Syrians.”

“The Ambassador and General Aoun discussed the political and security situation in Lebanon and the current situation in Syria,” said a statement issued by the U.S. Embassy after the talks.

Two armed men briefly set free a prisoner who was being transported in a police vehicle to a hospital in Beirut but their plot failed and the suspects escaped, the National News Agency reported on Thursday.

It said the patrol was transferring the prisoner from Rafik Hariri University Hospital to al-Hayat hospital when two men identified as Fawzi Sh. and Ahmed Q. pointed their guns at the officers and whisked the man in a black Kia.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat accused on Thursday General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim of utterly following the Syrian regime’s orders by deporting 14 Syrians.

“It would be useful to remind (Ibrahim) that Syria and during the stability period in the country didn’t have any true concept of independent judicial system, like all the other dictatorial regimes,” Jumblat said in a statement.

The Syndicate Coordination Committee announced on Thursday the resumption of the official exams correction for grades 12 and 9 after a series of negotiation with the cabinet.

The SCC said that teachers are expected to start issuing the results starting Saturday.

The Israeli Defense Ministry estimated that if the country engaged in a war with Hizbullah and Iran some 200 Israeli civilians would die.

According to Israeli newspaper Haaretz, the number of fatalities could rise to 300 if Syria joins the war as well.

Traffic that was halted for 35 days at the northern entrance of the southern city of Sidon resumed on Thursday after Salafist cleric Sheikh Ahmed al-Asir’s supporters removed their sit-in tents.

LBC TV said that some personal belongings were still being removed from the streets.