Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil lauded Wednesday Hezbollah MP Mohammed Raad's steadfastness after the killing of his son last week in an Israeli airstrike in south Lebanon.

"We, as Lebanese, must respect each other’s martyrs,” Bassil said as he offered his condolences to Raad in Beirut's southern suburbs.

Lebanon’s Central Bank is inclined to abolish the so-called lollar, a term coined by Lebanese economist Dan Azzi in 2019 to refer to a ‘Lebanese dollar’, or a dollar that became trapped in Lebanon’s banking system in the wake of the 2019 crisis, media reports said.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati had received on the occasion of Lebanon's independence day a letter from French President Emmanuel Macron that the Grand Serail published on Tuesday, a day before the PM met with the French President's envoy in Beirut.

Before his envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian reiterated the need to elect a President in a meeting with Mikati, Macron warned in his letter that the presidential vacancy might weigh on the country's ability to overcome its crises and to prevent a security deterioration related to the war in Gaza.

The five-nation group on Lebanon -- which comprises the U.S., France, KSA, Qatar and Egypt -- has agreed on a presidential candidate for Lebanon whose name will be highlighted in the coming days, al-Jadeed TV reported overnight.

French Special Presidential Envoy for Lebanon Jean-Yves Le Drian, who arrived in Beirut overnight, met Tuesday in Riyadh with Saudi Royal Court adviser Nizar al-Aloula.

Israeli soldiers opened fire Wednesday from the Abbad post on a Lebanese Army patrol near the southern border town of Houla, despite an unofficial truce.

During The four days of truce, calm was interrupted by occasional Israeli shelling and incessant buzz of Israeli surveillance drones, while Hezbollah abided by the truce.

French special presidential envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian, who arrived Tuesday in Beirut, met Wednesday with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and Army chief Gen. Joseph Aoun.

Le Drian is reportedly visiting the crisis-hit country in a bid to reactivate the presidential election file.

French Special Presidential Envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian is coming to Lebanon at a “totally inappropriate timing, seeing as he will not find any positive response, unlike the Qatari envoy,” the pro-Hezbollah al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Tuesday.

The Israeli artillery shelled Tuesday the outskirts of the border town of Aita al-Shaab, as calm almost prevailed over the border area in south Lebanon.

While Lebanon and Hezbollah weren't officially parties to the cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, it has brought at least a temporary halt to the daily exchanges of rockets, artillery shelling and airstrikes.

From Lebanon, Palestinian Fatima al-Ashwah has been praying for relatives in Gaza, but received grim news that Israeli bombing killed around 12 of them days before a temporary truce between Israel and Hamas.

"They bombed their house," leaving some of them "in pieces," said Ashwah, drained by weeks of anguish and days of grief.