Caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Wednesday withdrew his nomination for the PM post and stressed that Thursday’s binding parliamentary consultations to pick a new PM “should not be postponed under any excuse.”

“Ever since I tendered my resignation 50 days ago in response to the scream of the Lebanese, I have strenuously sought to fulfill their demand of forming a government of experts, which I believe that it alone can address the dangerous social and economic crisis that our country is facing,” Hariri said in a written statement.

Speaker Nabih Berri has advised caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri to communicate with Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil over the FPM’s participation in the new government, al-Jadeed TV reported on Wednesday.

“But so far no meeting has been scheduled between Hariri and Bassil,” al-Jadeed said.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Latif Daryan held phone talks Wednesday in the wake of the latest Sunni-Shiites tensions in the country.

In their discussions, Berri and Daryan emphasized on “the unity of Muslims within national unity and the unity of the Lebanese,” the National News Agency said.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri on Wednesday stressed that there will be no “political or partisan cover” for anyone who “harms unity and civil peace,” in the wake of the latest sectarianly-charged incidents in the country.

Speaking during his weekly meeting with lawmakers in Ain el-Tineh, Berri warned of “the scary scenes, the sectarian and regional slogans, infiltrators and those tampering with the fate of the people and the country.”

Security forces increased their presence around protest centers in central Beirut Wednesday, after several nights of violence disrupted two months of largely peaceful anti-government demonstrations.

Assailants attacked the office of a Sunni Muslim religious leader in the northern city of Tripoli, smashing in windows early on Wednesday, the National News Agency reported.

Prominent Shiite cleric Ali al-Amin lashed out at Hizbullah on Wednesday after the latter’s accusations that he is “normalizing ties with Israel.”

Army chief General Joseph Aoun reportedly warned many Lebanese officials of the “revolution of the hungry,” saying the military can not do much to prevent the “genuinely poor class” when they take to the streets in protest at dire economic conditions, media reports said Wednesday.

U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale is expected to visit Beirut on Thursday in line with Lebanon’s parliamentary consultations to name a new prime minister, media reports said on Wednesday.

A bodyguard of caretaker Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil on Tuesday snatched the cellphone of a prominent journalist during a U.N. forum in Geneva, the journalist said.

“Lebanese FM Jebran Bassil had his security confiscate my phone and erase the video when I was trying to interview him at UN Refugees forum in Geneva,” Lebanese-German journalist Jaafar Abdul Karim tweeted.