Israel threatened on Sunday to launch a large-scale military operation on southern Lebanon if the security situation continues to deteriorate in the region.

“Hizbullah has turned most of the villages in southern Lebanon into explosive spots,” security sources told the Israeli radio.

The Special Tribunal for Lebanon is expected to make a request to Lebanese authorities to question five Hizbullah members in the next few days after Lebanese judges traveled to The Hague ahead of the expected release of the indictment in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s assassination case, informed sources said.

The sources told pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat in remarks published Monday that the names of the five people would remain confidential for a short period.

Phalange Party leader Amin Gemayel on Sunday wondered “whether Prime Minister Najib Miqati will be able to reconcile between what he’s been saying regarding keenness on (Lebanon’s) international relations … and the objectives of Hizbullah, which had designated him” as premier.

In an interview on Al-Jadeed television, Gemayel added: “We have no problem with PM Miqati or with the ministers, but the government was formed for certain purposes: preserving (Hizbullah’s) weapons and abolishing the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.”

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday hoped Prime Minister Najib Miqati’s new government will shoulder its responsibilities without resorting to “one sided or spiteful” acts.

Upon his arrival in Beirut from a one-week visit to the Vatican during which he met with Pope Benedict XVI, several Holy See officials and a number of Lebanes expats, al-Rahi said: “We hope this government will truly shoulder its responsibilities and work in service of everyone and not in a one-sided or spiteful manner as some are claiming.”

The International Committee of the Red Cross in Lebanon on Sunday noted that “the ICRC and the Lebanese Red Cross are not planning to build a camp for Syrian refugees in northern Lebanon.”

The clarification came in response to a media report published by Ad-Diyar newspaper and circulated by a number of news websites.

Marada Movement leader MP Suleiman Franjieh on Sunday stressed that Lebanon can only survive through “consensus and unity among its various sects.”

“Throughout all the periods of our political action, we have not caused losses to the country like others did,” Franjieh said, addressing the cadres of his movement during a lecture in the northern town of Bnachii.

Head of the Mustaqbal parliamentary bloc, former premier Fouad Saniora, vowed Sunday that the March 14 camp will hold onto its stances and “remain committed to its values and principles.”

“In the face of the coup and those who have staged a coup against the democratic system by means of force and intimidation, we won’t be dragged into using force as a method,” Saniora pledged.

Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun stated on Saturday that the new majority succeeded in “rattling the mafia empire” that was established in Lebanon by the previous majority.

He said during the annual dinner for the FPM’s Baabda branch: “We are subject to false rumors and you should fortify yourselves against them.”

Syrian troops pushed towards the Lebanese border on Sunday as they pressed a deadly crackdown on dissent in central towns, where gunfire rattled overnight, activists said.

The latest violence in the town of Kseir, near the flashpoint city of Homs, forced "hundreds" of people to flee over the border into Lebanon, the activists said.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat stressed that he will not back any side that is seeking a confrontation on the internal and external scenes and aiming to create strife in Lebanon, his sources told Ad-Diyar daily on Sunday.

“Jumblat chose to support the majority out his interest to protect Lebanon from any problems,” they added.