Direct communication has taken place for the first time between caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and the Syrian government, after ministers and security chiefs used to be in charge of such contacts in recent years.

In a Facebook post, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s adviser Luna al-Shebel revealed that Syrian Prime Minister Hussein Arnous has received several phone calls from Mikati.

Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs Mélanie Joly arrived Tuesday in Lebanon on a two-day visit to the crisis-hit country.

Joly had been in Cyprus and will also be travelling to Türkiye and Greece.

Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has urged Lebanese authorities to open the seas for migrant boats to reach Europe, amid soaring anti-Syrian sentiment and accusations the West is seeking to keep refugees in Lebanon.

His remarks came in an apparent bid to pressure the European Union after it announced earlier this month $1 billion in aid to Lebanon to help tackle irregular migration.

Lebanon resumed Tuesday "voluntary returns" of Syrians, with dozens of families set to pass through two land border crossings in the country's east, a year and a half after such returns were paused.

300 refugees are expected to leave from Arsal in the Bekaa Valley on the Lebanese side of the border with Syria to Homs and al-Qalamoun in Syria, media reports said.

An Israeli drone raided Tuesday the southern border town of Mays al-Jabal and soon after, Hezbollah announced the death of one of its members from the town.

Israeli warplanes had struck overnight the towns of al-Khiam and Kfarkela, after Hezbollah carried out Monday seven attacks on Israeli posts in northern Israel and in the occupied Kfarshouba Hills, wounding at least 4 soldiers.

Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Monday stressed that “the main and real objective of Lebanon's front is to pressure Israel to halt the war in Gaza.”

“The Lebanese front is imposing equations and its connection to the Gaza front is categorical,” Nasrallah said in a televised speech commemorating Hezbollah’s slain military commander Mustafa Badreddine.

During a meeting with members of the Lebanese expat community in Michigan, U.S. mediator Amos Hochstein promised U.S. help in rebuilding the destroyed villages in south Lebanon, a media report said.

“Should the negotiations related to Resolution 1701 succeed and if a president who can guarantee stability is elected, the region will witness a period of economic prosperity,” Hochstein said, according to the Nidaa al-Watan newspaper.

The lawyer for the Lebanese-New Jersey man charged with stabbing author Salman Rushdie is in talks with county and federal prosecutors to try to resolve existing charges of attempted murder without a trial — as well as potential terrorism-related charges that could still be coming, he said.

Hadi Matar, 26, has been held without bail since his 2022 arrest, immediately after allegedly attacking the internationally acclaimed writer in front of a stunned audience he was about to address at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York. Rushdie was blinded in one eye, and moderator Henry Reese also was wounded.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati on Monday noted that “the continuation of the campaigns against the government in the Syrian refugee file is an approach that is clearly aimed at distorting the truth for populist goals.”

Some are seeking to “paralyze the work of the government and preoccupy it with futile bickering and debates,” Mikati lamented, in remarks at the Grand Serail.

Parliament will convene Wednesday to discuss a deal with the EU including a financial package of $1 billion in aid for Lebanon as the EU urged the crisis-hit country to tackle illegal migration to the bloc.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has asked his political aide, Amal MP Ali Hassan Khalil, to discuss with all the parliamentary blocs their proposals regarding a recommendation to the government on the European aid deal that Parliament will issue during Wednesday's session, al-Jadeed said.