Progressive Socialist Party leader ex-MP Walid Jumblat on Wednesday urged an end to what he called “hatred theories” targeted against the Sunni community in Lebanon, in the wake of a deadly attack in Tripoli by an ex-fighter of the jihadist Islamic State group.

“Enough with spreading the theories of spite and hatred against the Sunnis. Terrorism has neither a religion nor an identity and it should be combated through lifting oppression off the (Islamic) detainees through putting them on trial and doing them justice,” Jumblat tweeted.

The deadly armed attack in Tripoli has sparked a new war of words between Defense Minister Elias Bou Saab of the Free Patriotic Movement and al-Mustaqbal Movement Secretary-General Ahmed Hariri.

The row started after Bou Saab said Prime Minister Saad Hariri had not called him after the attack.

Interior Minister Raya al-Hassan on Tuesday stressed that security forces maintain full readiness to tackle any security incident, in the wake of the deadly overnight attack in the northern city of Tripoli.

President Michel Aoun reassured Tuesday that the overnight deadly attack by an Islamic State lone gunman in Tripoli will not affect stability in the country, as Prime Minister Saad Hariri called for “uprooting the remnants of terrorism.”

Iran has asked Lebanese authorities to send a delegation to Tehran in order to be handed over the Lebanese detainee Nizar Zakka, who has been held in Iran since 2015.

“After the lengthy efforts that were lately intensified, the Iranian ambassador to Beirut called the Foreign Minister (Jebran Bassil) and officially informed him that the relevant Iranian authorities have positively responded to Lebanese President General Michel Aoun’s plea to his Iranian counterpart Sheikh Hassan Rouhani and to the Foreign Minister’s letter to his Iranian counterpart regarding the pardon of Lebanese national Nizar Zakka for the occasion of Eid al-Fitr,” the Foreign Ministry said.

A lone gunman using a motorcycle fired on police and army vehicles in different parts of the northern city of Tripoli on Monday night, killing two police officers and two soldiers and wounding several others before blowing himself up later when confronted by troops, the army and the state-run National News Agency said.

Troops were deployed in areas of the city to search for the attacker, who was tracked down to an apartment, the army said. It said members of an elite military intelligence force stormed the apartment early Tuesday and opened fire at the suspect, who then set off an explosive belt he was wearing.

The Lebanese General Security agency on Monday was handed over by Syrian authorities the Lebanese nationals Wissam Kranbeh and Nayef Rayed, Lebanon's National News Agency said.

The two men will now be interrogated by the agency, NNA added.

Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Jebran Bassil on Monday said that there are political parties that are “seeking to sabotage the presidential understanding,” referring to the political settlement that led to President Michel Aoun's election and Prime Minister Saad Hariri's designation.

“Some are seeking to sabotage the presidential understanding, and they have expressed their madness to achieve this sabotage but they won't succeed,” Bassil said at a press conference dedicated to putting the public in the picture of the FPM ministers' “achievements” over the past 100 days.

Iranian authorities might soon release Lebanese detainee Nizar Zakka from prison, Iranian media reports said on Monday.

“Zakka's release will take place at the request of Lebanese President Michel Aoun, who has called on Iranian authorities to free him,” the Tabnak news portal, which is close to Iran's revolutionary guard, said.

State Commissioner to the Military Court of Appeals Ghassan al-Khoury on Monday filed an appeal before the court against the Military Court's controversial acquittal of Lt. Col. Suzanne al-Hajj in the Ziad Itani case.

The National News Agency said Khoury called for a retrial of al-Hajj and the hacker Elie Ghabash and for considering the verdicts as null and void.