Israel is keen to make a deal with Lebanon regarding the maritime border, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said in a meeting with U.N. diplomats in New York on Tuesday.

“The State of Israel is interested in progressing maritime border negotiations with Lebanon,” Gantz said. “In the end, there will be two gas rigs, one Israeli and one Lebanese. The question is whether we can reach this scenario without an unnecessary escalation as a result of Hezbollah threats,” he added, according to English-language remarks published by Israel’s Jerusalem Post.

President Michel Aoun on Tuesday stressed “the need to exert every effort to form a new government.”

He added, in a meeting with a delegation from the Economic Committees, that the alternative would be to “bolster the current government with six new state ministers who would be politicians.”

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri will call for a presidential vote session before the end of President Michel Aoun’s term on October 31, MP Ali Hassan Khalil announced on Tuesday.

“Several sessions might be held,” Khalil added, following a meeting between Berri’s Development and Liberation bloc and a delegation from the Change bloc.

Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati on Tuesday stressed that he will “continue all the efforts aimed at forming the new government.”

“All those concerned must meanwhile support these efforts and refrain from continuing to put conditions and obstacles in a blatant attempt to achieve political gains whose timing is inappropriate and which cannot be accepted,” Mikati added.

President Michel Aoun has again hinted that he might not leave the presidential palace on October 31 should no new government be formed and should no new president be elected.

As pressure continues to mount on affected people in Lebanon and vulnerabilities continue to deepen day after day, the Humanitarian Coordinator a.i, Edouard Beigbeder, announced that the Lebanon Humanitarian Fund (LHF) has allocated US$8 million to meet urgent needs and enhance preparedness ahead of the fast-approaching winter, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Lebanon said.

"Vulnerable families in Lebanon are affected by insufficient access to water, unaffordable prices of basic commodities, limited access to life-saving services, thus taking desperate measures to survive, and we need to act now and avoid a further deterioration of the humanitarian situation," stated the Humanitarian Coordinator a.i.

Six Syrians including two infants have died of thirst and hunger as they attempted to cross the Mediterranean Sea in a makeshift boat that likely sailed from Lebanon.

Caretaker Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib on Monday confirmed that U.S. mediator Amos Hochstein has made new proposals regarding the sea border demarcation file.

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) on Monday stressed that it is still coordinating its patrols with the Lebanese Army, dismissing rumors and false reports in this regard.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi has called on President Michel Aoun to “exert efforts with all those concerned to elect a president prior to the end of his term and to ‘do the impossible’ to achieve this.”