A European judicial delegation will return to Lebanon in late April, specifically after April 22, to continue its investigations in the embezzlement and money laundering case against Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh, an NGO said.

Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab announced Wednesday, after a joint committees session, that "it has become impossible to stage the municipal elections," as he blamed the government for failing to secure the needed funds.

Joint parliamentary committees convened Wednesday to discuss funding the municipal elections, while caretaker Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi and caretaker Finance Minister Youssef Khalil failed to attend the session.

Free Patriotic Movement Jebran Bassil has condemned a barrage of rockets fired from Lebanon that triggered Israeli strikes.

"We don't need anyone to use our land to send messages," Bassil said, adding that "we should have learned from our past."

The Lebanese presidential file is not a priority in the Saudi-Iranian negotiations, political sources said.

Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat is still clinging to his initiative for resolving the presidential crisis, a media report said.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi has called for the election of a “maestro” president for the country.

Joint parliamentary committees will convene on Wednesday morning to discuss funding the municipal elections.

Caretaker Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi had urged the government to secure the necessary funds and complete the administrative preparations for the elections that are supposed to start on May 7.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel "will not allow the terrorist Hamas to establish itself in Lebanon".

Netanyahu vowed at a news conference Monday to restore security "on all fronts" after surging violence that included rocket fire from Lebanon and Syria and two more deaths on Monday.

Should consensus be secured over a new president, Saudi Arabia has expressed desire to see ex-PM Tammam Salam designated to form a new government, sources said.

It was a cold night 50 years ago when an Israeli commando team led by a man disguised as a woman infiltrated a posh Beirut neighborhood and shot and killed three top officials from the Palestine Liberation Organization in their apartments.

The anniversary is little noted, but the April 10, 1973 operation has a relevance that continues today.