Hezbollah said Friday that seven of its fighters have been killed, but didn't specify where they died other than to say that they were “martyred on the road to Jerusalem.”

A Hezbollah official and a Lebanese security official said the seven fighters were killed in neighboring Syria Friday morning. They spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

The head of Hezbollah’s religious committee, Sheikh Mohammed Yazbek, has called for the election of a new Lebanese president.

“It’s about time the Lebanese met around a dialogue table to exit the lethal vacuum through electing a president and restoring regularity in state institutions,” Yazbek said.

The United States is not concerned over “the ongoing confrontations on the border in south Lebanon,” diplomatic sources said.

In remarks to the Nidaa al-Watan newspaper published Friday, the sources attributed the U.S. stance to “the presence of a ceiling governing these confrontations, which has resulted from the ongoing contacts between Washington and Tehran.”

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hosted Wednesday evening a secret meeting of the leaders of the pro-Tehran factions in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Yemen, during which he stressed the need to close ranks and defended the strategy avoiding engagement in an all-out war, which has been “clearly endorsed” by Tehran and Hezbollah in dealing with the Gaza war, a source in Khamenei’s office said.

The source told Kuwait’s al-Jarida newspaper that Hezbollah was represented in the meeting by the head of its executive council, Sayyed Hashem Saffieddine.

Israeli artillery shelling targeted Friday the outskirts of the southern border town of Ramia, as reconnaissance drones overflew south Lebanon at a low altitude, violating Lebanese air space.

Hezbollah later attacked many Israeli posts including al-Assi, al-Manara, al-Bayyad, al-Mutella, al-Jerdah, Berket Risha, and the Dhaira post. The Israeli army shelled in response Mays al-Jabal's outskirts and the town's hospital, Blida, Mhaibib, and Marwahin. It also shelled al-Labbouneh, and the outskirts of several Lebanese border towns.

Marada Movement chief Suleiman Franjieh has noted that he has met with most Arab ambassadors in Lebanon and that none of them has informed him of any negative stance regarding his presidential nomination.

“To those who consider that my presidential chances have ended I tell them no, and to those saying that my presidential chances are 100% I also tell them no. My chances are rather 50/50 and Saudi Arabia has not placed any veto on my nomination,” Franjieh said in an interview on LBCI television.

Former General Security chief Abbas Ibrahim has confirmed a role in the negotiations with Hamas over a prisoner swap with Israel.

"Few hours separate us from the humanitarian truce in Gaza," Ibrahim said in a televised interview on Wednesday night.

The area around Dar al-Fatwa in Beirut witnessed a popular protest that forced the cancellation of a visit by U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Dorothy Shea.

Protesters in Lebanon have accused Washington of supporting the killing of civilians in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli army.

Hezbollah on Thursday fired anti-tank missiles at the Margaliot and Ramim Israeli military posts near Lebanon's border, as the Israeli army shelled southern border areas.

An Israeli army spokesman meanwhile said that an Israeli drone came under fire over the occupied Shebaa Farms.

Israeli air strikes killed three pro-Iran fighters on Wednesday as they hit sites belonging to Lebanon's Hezbollah near the Syrian capital Damascus, a war monitor said.

Israel has struck Syria several times in the past month as regional tensions simmer over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.