U.S. President Barack Obama said Thursday the United States has canceled military exercises with Egypt to protest the killing of hundreds of protesters, in his first public statement on the rapid developments in Egypt.

He interrupted his weeklong vacation to address the clashes that have left more than 500 people dead.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Miqati condemned on Friday the kidnapping of a Turkish pilot and copilot in Beirut, saying Lebanese authorities were exerting all efforts to find the abductors.

"We expressed our condemnation of the kidnapping, we are in the process of making every effort to determine the identities of the kidnappers," Miqati told Agence France Presse.

Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun on Tuesday blamed the “procrastination” in the cabinet formation process on “foreign hegemony,” slamming officials over the “dangerous things” that are happening in the country.

“Officials do not know the reason behind the procrastination in the cabinet formation process and this is one of the ugliest things, as they only execute the orders without knowing the reason,” Aoun told reporters after the weekly meeting of the Change and Reform bloc in Rabiyeh.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat noted on Monday that years ago Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has sought to liberate all of Lebanese occupied territory, but the party is now seeking to liberate the whole of Palestine from Israeli occupation.

He said in response to Nasrallah's recent speech: “Let the Palestinians decide their fate themselves.”

Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Friday noted that “Israel's demise is a national Lebanese interest,” stressing that Hizbullah will continue to “protect our country alongside the national Lebanese army" and that it will not "abandon Palestine," as he made a rare public appearance at a rally in Dahieh.

It was the first appearance in public since last September for Nasrallah, public enemy number one for Israel and a staunch ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad whose troops have been battling an insurgency since 2011. His appearance comes less than two weeks after the European Union listed Hizbullah's military wing as a "terrorist" organization.

One person was killed and three others were injured on Thursday in a major blaze triggered by fireworks at Beirut's Martyrs Square near the headquarters of An Nahar newspaper, state-run National News Agency reported.

Earlier, a loud blast was heard during a live report broadcast by OTV from the location and the camera captured the scene of several cars that went up in flames at a parking lot.

Hundreds of citizens demonstrated on Thursday at Beirut's Martyrs Square in support of the military institution as Lebanon marked the 68th Army Day.

Demonstrators carried banners saying “You love the army? Don't aim your weapon at it” as well as Lebanese flags and the flags of the army.

At least 40 people were killed in an ammunitions depot blast Thursday in a government-held area of Homs in central Syria apparently triggered by rebel rocket fire, a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which earlier reported 22 killed, warned that the death toll could rise further as many of the 100 people wounded were in serious condition.

Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun on Tuesday announced that he intends to form a “national front” to defend the constitution and prevent “the disintegration of the state,” describing the mechanism devised to extend the term of Army chief General Jean Qahwaji as “illegitimate.”

“We want to immunize the military institution against those who want to tamper with its hierarchy and are issuing edicts that are harming the military hierarchy and manipulating the law,” said Aoun after the weekly meeting of the Change and Reform parliamentary bloc.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Friday vowed that the LF will continue to search for the Lebanese detainees who “went missing” in Syrian prisons, noting that “there are millions of captives in Lebanon" and accusing Hizbullah of putting the fate of the Lebanese people in danger.

“The detainees in the prisons of the Syrian regime were used for political ends and I ask everyone to be confident that we will carry on with our efforts to release them,” Geagea said at a seminar in Maarab on the Lebanese detainees in Syrian prisons.