The Israeli army withdrew Thursday from the southern areas of Qantara, Adsheet al-Qusayr and Wadi al-Hujeir after it made a several-hour incursion that forced residents to flee and involved the abduction and wounding of a Lebanese UNIFIL employee.

Sources in the Israeli army have told the Haaretz newspaper that the Israeli military “will have to stay in Lebanon until the Lebanese army can fulfill its commitments under the terms of the cease-fire deal, which include attaining full control of southern Lebanon.”

Footage of a priest with a machinegun slung over his shoulder inside a church in Lebanon’s Mazraat Yachouh has gone viral on social media and stirred controversy in the country.

Syrian interim foreign minister Asaad al-Shibani has received a phone call from Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib, Syria's official news agency SANA said.

Army Commander General Joseph Aoun has traveled to Saudi Arabia at an invitation from his Saudi counterpart Air Chief Marshal Fayyadh al-Ruwaili, the Lebanese Army said on Thursday.

Israeli forces on Thursday made an incursion into the southern areas of al-Qantara, Adsheet al-Qusayr and Wadi al-Hujeir in violation of the ceasefire agreement, the Lebanese Army said.

“The Israeli enemy is pressing on with its violation of the ceasefire agreement, attacks on Lebanon’s sovereignty and citizens, and destruction of southern villages and towns,” the army said.

A "strategic weapons shipment" for Hezbollah was the target of the Israeli airstrike that hit a building in Lebanon's Bekaa at dawn Wednesday, Al-Arabiya television reported Thursday.

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) on Thursday warned that “any actions that risk the fragile cessation of hostilities” in south Lebanon “must cease.”

Israeli warplanes targeted a two-story house at dawn Wednesday in the plain of the Baalbek district town of Taraya, causing no casualties, the National News Agency and media reports said.

United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Tom Fletcher, has vowed to help lead Lebanon into a new phase.

"I will certainly be doing everything I can do to support Lebanon enter a new phase," Fletcher said in an televised interview with LBCI.