The United States on Wednesday condemned a cross-border Syrian helicopter gunship attack on the eastern Lebanese town of Arsal, calling it an "unacceptable provocation which risked dragging Lebanon into war.

"The United States condemns in the strongest terms today's helicopter attack by the Syrian regime on Arsal," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea stated on Wednesday that Hizbullah should not take part in any upcoming cabinet because it “rejected the state,” slamming March 8's “practices that model those of the Takfiris.”

"Hizbullah's messages were clear and the party should not take part in any cabinet,” Geagea said in a press conference he held in Maarab.

Dozens of demonstrators on Tuesday held a sit-in in front of the Lebanese embassy in Kuwait to protest Hizbullah's interference in the Syrian crisis.

"The protesters burned a picture of Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah,” Naharnet correspondent in Kuwait reported, adding that they demanded placing the party on the list of terrorist organizations.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday he had always believed that Syrian strongman Bashar Assad should have implemented political reforms that could have averted the current bloodbath.

But Putin also stressed that he remained firmly opposed to outside intervention and implied that Russia's position on the crisis remained unchanged.

Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun on Tuesday said countries sponsoring and arming the Syrian opposition must share the “burden” of the refugees and wounded who arrived in Lebanon from the war-torn country, warning that “crippling” the Constitutional Council will lead to “unknown repercussions.”

“They have been mentioning camps for Syrian refugees in Lebanon and I've heard remarks by the EU's ambassador that it is impossible for Lebanon to bear this burden and we've heard the social affairs minister's remarks, and we tell them, 'thank God you've woken up,'” Aoun said after the weekly meeting of the Change and Reform parliamentary bloc in Rabiyeh.

Dozens of Syrian and Lebanese fighters wounded in fighting against Syrian regime troops and Hizbullah forces in Qusayr have been evacuated to Lebanon, security officials said Saturday.

They were evacuated as the regime seized the last remaining insurgent bastion in the Qusayr area of central Syria, near the Lebanese border.

One person was killed and five other people were wounded on Friday afternoon as clashes renewed in central Tripoli between armed Salafists and gunmen loyal to Damascus and Hizbullah.

A security source told Agence France Presse that one person was killed and five others wounded in the old souks area as a house went up in flames after being hit by a shell.

After new clashes between Syrian troops and rebels in the Golan, and Austria's announced withdrawal from a U.N. monitoring force, Israel is concerned about security along its ceasefire line with Syria.

The Israeli army remained on high alert in the region on Friday, bringing up reinforcements of tanks and troops, and readying an anti-tank missile unit, media said.

U.S. Republican senator John McCain warned on Thursday that the more than two-year-old war in Syria was reopening confessional wounds in Lebanon and said thousands of Hizbullah fighters were operating in the country.

“Old sectarian wounds are being reopened in Lebanon,” McCain said.

One person was killed and seven others were hurt as fierce clashes spread to the heart of the northern city of Tripoli on Thursday, after a security plan by the Lebanese army managed to relatively contain the violence in the flashpoint districts of Bab al-Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen.

The army deployed in the souk area, restoring a tense calm four hours after the clash broke out between Salafists who support the revolt in Syria and pro-Damascus fighters, a security official told Agence France Presse.