As Lebanon prepares for its parliamentary elections, it is still not clear if and how the expatriates will participate.

Interior Minister Ahmad al-Hajjar said that despite all the confusion, the elections will be held on time.

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam met Friday on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference with Melissa Parke, Executive Director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, a global civil society coalition that won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize. He commended the organization's leading role in promoting nuclear disarmament and strengthening global peace.

Salam noted that “Lebanon's steadfast position -- shared by all member state of the Arab League and calling for the establishment of a zone free of nuclear weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East -- is more crucial than ever, given the ongoing wars, the alarming rise in military spending, and the increase in the number of nuclear warheads after a period of decline since the mid-1980s.”

Al-Mustaqbal Movement leader ex-PM Saad Hariri kicked off his political activity in Lebanon by meeting U.S. Ambassador Michel Issa at the Center House.

Hariri had arrived Thursday in Lebanon and will on Saturday deliver a speech marking the 21st anniversary of the assassination of ex-PM Rafik Hariri.

President Joseph Aoun said Friday, a day ahead of the anniversary of former PM Rafik Hariri's assassination, that "a man who dedicated his life to the project of the state" is missed, as Lebanon moves to disarm Hezbollah and extend the state's authority to all territories.

Aoun described Hariri as a man who believed in the state and dedicated his life to rebuild Lebanon after a devastating civil war, and to strengthen the country's ties with the Arab and international worlds.

Lebanon has secured temporary exemptions for freight vehicles hauling certain goods after a recent ban by Damascus on foreign trucks.

Damascus had issued a decision on Saturday stipulating that "non-Syrian trucks will not be allowed to enter" the country, and that goods being imported by road must be unloaded at specific points at border crossings.

An Israeli strike on south Lebanon killed one person on Thursday, Lebanon's health ministry reported, while the Israeli military said it killed a member of Iran-backed Hezbollah.

Despite a November 2024 truce that sought to end more than a year of hostilities including two months of all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah, Israel has kept up regular strikes on Lebanon and has maintained troops in five areas it deems "strategic".

Israeli troops have recently intensified their incursions into southern border villages, where they detonate houses, bulldoze lands, uproot trees, and sometimes kill or abduct people.

They've also been dropping stun grenades to scare or disperse people, sometimes during funerals.

A meeting scheduled to be held in Doha to pave the way for the Lebanese Army support conference has been postponed, local al-Liwaa newspaper said Thursday.

The daily said it had learned from informed diplomatic sources that the Doha meeting will not take place next week, as scheduled, for technical reasons.

Cabinet will convene at 3pm Monday to discuss the army’s plan for monopolizing arms north of the Litani River, media reports said.

Information Minister Paul Morcos confirmed Wednesday in an interview that the government would decide next week on how to proceed with the plan.

Israeli troops advanced Thursday at dawn into al-Nouriyeh neighborhood in central Kafr Kila, where they blew up a building.

Another force had pushed into the southern border town of Odaisseh overnight, demolishing another two houses on the outskirts of the town.