The Lebanese Forces, the Progressive Socialist Party, the Kataeb Party and a number of independent MPs are preparing to endorse a new plan to deal with the presidential crisis, after parliament failed to elect a president despite holding ten electoral sessions, an LF MP said.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi stressed Sunday that the election of a new president does not happen through “the heresy of prior agreement on him,” but rather through “a vote combined with consultations.”

Lebanon's navy and U.N. peacekeepers on Saturday rescued more than 200 migrants from a boat sinking in the Mediterranean Sea hours after it left northern Lebanon's coast, the military said in a statement. Two migrants were killed in the incident.

A political decision has been taken to call for a caretaker cabinet session in the beginning of the new year, a media report said on Saturday.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has said that he will not call anew for dialogue over the presidential file, stressing that “consensus” is essential for the election of a new president.

A televised speech by Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah scheduled for Friday evening has been postponed for “health reasons,” Hezbollah’s media relations department said.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has called in front of his visitors for sidelining Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil in the presidential file and “moving to Plan B,” a media report said on Friday.

“Plan B is based on seriously promoting the presidential nomination of Marada Movement chief Suleiman Franjieh with the beginning of the new year,” informed sources told ad-Diyar newspaper.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati on Friday pledged to continue carrying out his “duties” despite any “obstructions or difficulties.”

“We hope the new year will be the start of Lebanon’s exit from the stifling crisis it is going through,” Mikati said, during an end-of-the-year meeting with the premiership’s employees.

A Hezbollah commander and his bodyguard, both Lebanese, were killed when Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militants targeted their military vehicle with a guided missile in Aleppo’s western countryside, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Friday.

The attack also killed a Syrian national.

At a time the Lebanese were expecting French President Emmanuel Macron to visit the country, French Defense Minister Sébastien Lecornu will arrive in Beirut in the coming hours, a media report said.

While in Lebanon Lecornu will spend New Year’s Eve with the French troops and will inspect some French sites and projects in the country, al-Joumhouria newspaper reported on Friday.