Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil has announced that the FPM will practice “positive opposition” in the face of the new government, noting that it will follow up on a number of files it had “struggled” for.

Israel asked the Trump administration on Monday for another extension to the deadline for the Israeli army withdrawal from southern Lebanon, but won’t get it, a U.S. official told The Times of Israel.

The ceasefire monitoring committee has been informed that the Israeli army is asking to stay in some points in south Lebanon until February 28, LBCI TV reported on Wednesday.

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said overnight that the state must be in control of all Lebanese territory, in a televised interview days before a deadline to implement the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire agreement.

Salam's government, which was officially formed on Saturday after more than two years of caretaker leadership, faces the daunting task of overseeing the fragile ceasefire and rebuilding a war-scarred country.

With the already extended deadline for Israel to withdraw from Lebanon fast approaching, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly asked U.S. President Donald Trump to support a further extension of the Israeli army’s deployment there.

Speaker Nabih Berri has told his visitors that he fears that Israel will not withdraw its forces from south Lebanon by the February 18 deadline, despite the reassurances of the countries that sponsor the ceasefire monitoring committee.

President Joseph Aoun told the new ministers during the first cabinet session on Tuesday that their belonging should be “only to the state.”

The new government held its first session Tuesday at the Baabda Palace during which a ministerial panel was formed to draft the government’s policy statement.

Salman Rushdie was so stunned when a masked man started to stab him on a stage in western New York that the author didn't even try to fight back, a prosecutor said Monday during opening statements in the suspect's attempted murder trial.

Prosecutors told jurors that the author came "dangerously close" to dying.

Hezbollah has launched attacks on Syrian security forces and is sponsoring cross-border smuggling gangs, the new Syrian authorities said on Monday, according to state media.

Syrian forces clashed with smuggling gangs this week, most of whom were affiliated with Hezbollah, but did not target Lebanese territory, Lieutenant Colonel Moayed al-Salama said in a statement carried by official news agency SANA.