A gunman opened fire Friday at a mosque in eastern Lebanon, killing one person and wounding several others, the Lebanese army and state news agency said. The reason behind the shooting in the eastern town of Bar Elias was not immediately clear.

The Lebanese army issued a statement saying that the armed man opened fire at a group of people as they were leaving the mosque, killing one of them. It added that as troops tried to detain the gunman, he opened fire at the force whose members fired back and wounded him. The army said he was being held in a hospital.

Hezbollah has told the relevant parties that it is against the appointment of a new central bank governor by the current caretaker Cabinet, media reports said.

Moreover, the party will not attend any Cabinet session aimed at naming a successor to outgoing Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh and it is in favor of the first vice governor assuming Salameh’s missions when the latter’s term expires on July 31, the reports said.

Hezbollah has learned about a "suspicious diplomatic" drive aiming to demarcate land borders between Lebanon and Israel, ad-Diyar newspaper reported Friday.

The land demarcation has been discussed with Lebanese officials in foreign capitals during several meetings, the daily claimed.

The MPs of the northern National Moderation Bloc have given the government two months to give an answer regarding the reopening of the Qlayaat airport – currently a military airbase – to civil aviation.

“We have given the government a two-month deadline. If the answer turns out to be positive, we will salute it, but if it comes out negative, we are preparing for major popular protests,” MP Walid al-Baarini said in an interview with the Nidaa al-Watan newspaper.

The British Embassy in Lebanon welcomed the UK Defense Senior Advisor to the Middle East and North Africa (DSAME) Air Marshal Martin Sampson to Lebanon from 5 to 6 July.

Sampson met Army Commander General Joseph Aoun), caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and caretaker Foreign Affairs Minister Abdallah Bou Habib. He was accompanied during his visits by Charge D’Affaires Camilla Nickless and the Defense Attaché Lt. Colonel Lee Saunders.

The term of embattled three-decade chief Riad Salameh ends this month with no successor in sight, setting the stage for a leadership crisis at the central bank nearly four years into Lebanon's severe economic meltdown.

Lebanon since last year has been governed by a caretaker cabinet with limited powers and without a president, and naming a high official could take months of political horse-trading.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has threatened to respond to any “violation” of Israel’s “sovereignty,” hours after Israel shelled open areas in south Lebanon in response to mortar fire.

Amal MP Ali Hassan Khalil has called on behalf of Amal and Speaker Nabih Berri for the publishing of an audit report submitted by the Alvarez & Marsal international auditing firm.

The Finance Ministry had denied last week accusations that it had “hidden” the forensic audit report.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi believes that “things are headed for the worse, the presidential vacuum will protract and the dialogue that is being called for is not serious,” Bkirki sources said.

“There is a Shiite Duo-backed premier who is acting in an unwise manner, contrary to the previous and current Sunni leaders, and he is behaving as if there is no vacant top Christian post,” the sources told the Nidaa al-Watan in remarks published Thursday.

The Central Bank’s four vice governors – Wassim Mansouri, Bashir Yakzan, Salim Chahine and Alexander Mouradian – on Thursday stressed “the need to appoint a governor as soon as possible as per Article 18 of the Money and Credit Code,” warning that they would “take the appropriate measure” in the absence of that.