Bernard Émié -- the Director of France’s General Directorate for External Security, France's main external intelligence agency -- is in Beirut along with five French officials on a secret visit, al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Tuesday.

A Qatari envoy is expected to arrive in Beirut this week, political sources told the Kuwaiti al-Anbaa newspaper, in remarks published Tuesday.

The five-nation group for Lebanon -- the United States, Saudi Arabia, France, Egypt and Qatar -- has been intensifying its efforts to help break the presidential impasse and keep Lebanon out of the Gaza war.

Israeli army Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee has hailed Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil’s rejection of a Hamas statement that announced the establishment in Lebanon of a division called al-Aqsa Flood Vanguards and called on Palestinian youths to join it.

With a journalist or media worker killed every day on average in the Israel-Hamas war, the head of the global organization representing the profession said that it has become a conflict beyond compare.

About 60 have been killed since the Oct. 7 start of the war, already close to the same number of journalists killed during the entire Vietnam War half a century ago. Other brutal wars in the Middle East have not come close to the intensity of the current one.

Majestic cedar trees towered over dozens of Lebanese Christians gathered outside a small mid-19th century chapel hidden in a mountain forest to celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration, the miracle where Jesus Christ, on a mountaintop, shined with light before his disciples.

The sunset's yellow light coming through the cedar branches bathed the leader of Lebanon's Maronite Church, Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, as he stood at a wooden podium and delivered a sermon. Then the gathering sang hymns in Arabic and the Aramaic language.

Israel is determined to kill Hamas’ leaders “in every location” in the world, including Qatar, Turkey, and Lebanon, even if it takes many years, Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar said in recordings revealed Sunday.

“In every location, in Gaza, in the West Bank, in Lebanon, in Turkey, in Qatar, everyone,” he said in recordings aired by the Kan public broadcaster Sunday evening. “It will take a few years, but we will be there in order to do it.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen has publicly declared that he has carried out contacts with Paris and European capitals regarding the clashes-hit border with Lebanon and Israeli media outlets have published some details about these talks.

During his latest visit to Lebanon, U.S. mediator Amos Hochstein tried to raise the issue of land border delineation according to an equation that he said Israel “would accept,” a media report said.

The equation includes “vacating all the contested points in Lebanon’s favor, including withdrawal from the northern part of Ghajar and key posts in the occupied Shebaa Farms, on the condition that the matter be implemented in two stages: declaring the Lebanese identity of these territories and agreeing that the U.N. oversee them militarily and security- and social-wise until the emergence of another political situation,” al-Akhbar newspaper said.

The Free Patriotic Movement has said that “there is no need for the Lebanese Forces to be tense or to justify why it is seeking the extension” of the term of Army chief General Joseph Aoun.

The Israeli army shelled Monday several border towns in south Lebanon as Hezbollah targeted groups of soldiers in northern Israel.

Hezbollah said it targeted several Israeli posts including Ruwaisat al-Alam, al-Baghdadi post, and groups of soldiers in Shtula, Misgav Am, Karm al-Touffah near the Branit Barracks and al-Raheb post. The group said all attacks were direct hits and inflicted casualties.