The Israeli army said Monday that two of its soldiers were lightly wounded in a face-to-face clash with a Hezbollah fighter during search operations in the al-Shakif area of south Lebanon.

“A Hezbollah terrorist inside a building opened fire on the forces” and “the forces immediately returned fire, killing the terrorist,” the Israeli army said.

There’s only one month left to apply for the UK Government’s flagship Chevening Scholarships program for the scholastic year 27-28.

President Joseph Aoun declared Monday that "Israel's repeated attacks, the killing of innocents, including children and women, the destruction and burning of homes, and the bulldozing of property are condemned, rejected, and unjustified crimes.”

“These actions target the framework agreement and undermine all efforts to halt the escalation in the South and the region as a whole," warned Aoun in a meeting with French Justice Minister Gérard Darmanin in the presence of Lebanese Justice Minister Adel Nassar.

Israeli warplanes on Monday carried out a fresh wave of strikes on the southern town of Nabatieh al-Fawqa, after Israeli strikes in the Nabatieh region killed 18 people over the past 36 hours.

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam has responded to criticism from Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea as to perceived sidelining of Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji by saying that “the constitution stipulates that the Council of Ministers is the one that sets the government’s general policy in all fields, including foreign policy, while each minister is responsible for managing the affairs of their ministry and implementing this policy within their powers.”

“Hence, the foreign policy of the Lebanese state is not the policy of a person or ministry in isolation from the government,” Salam noted.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea has noted that “the dawn of sovereignty has undoubtedly broken” in Lebanon, vowing that the LF and its allies “will not allow anyone to obstruct its emergence, whether through bullying the state and the free, sovereign Lebanese, or through appeasement, procrastination, stalling, and patchwork solutions.”

The state should be “sovereign over its land and its decisions,” stressed Geagea in an annual speech commemorating the “Martyrs of the Lebanese Resistance.”

Justice Minister Adel Nassar announced Monday that Beirut port blast investigator Judge Tarek Bitar has concluded his investigations and referred the file to the Public Prosecutor's Office for its review, paving the way for the indictment.

“We expect this stage to be completed during or towards the end of October, a crucial step towards uncovering the truth and achieving justice in one of the most painful cases for the Lebanese people," Nassar wrote on X.

The Israeli army claimed Saturday that it struck Hezbollah operatives and infrastructure a day earlier in response to an explosive drone that was allegedly launched by Hezbollah but caused no casualties.

Israel carried out a series of airstrikes on Thursday evening on several areas in south Lebanon and, for the first time in three months, an area in West Bekaa.

MP Ihab Hamadeh of Hezbollah noted Friday that "there is still ambiguity surrounding the reality of Israel's control over the Ali al-Taher hill," in the first comment from the Iran-backed group regarding Israel’s overnight announcement.

"How can the Israeli enemy claim to control the Ali al-Taher hill when it continues to bombard and raid it relentlessly, knowing that it controls it from the air or by surrounding it geographically from all sides, without its forces being able to enter the facility or gain control of it on the ground," Hamadeh told Russia’s Sputnik radio.