Cabinet convened Monday at the Grand Serail to continue the discussion of the draft state budget.

The session will focus today on social welfare to families in need as Social Affairs Minister Hector Hajjar is expected to submit a proposal today.

Strong Lebanon bloc MP Alain Aoun has said that “it is possible that the Free Patriotic Movement will ally with Hizbullah in the parliamentary elections despite all the differences between them.”

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday stressed that Lebanese officials “do not have the right to reject the hands that are extended to help them,” in an apparent reference to the paper of Arab and international demands that has been presented to Lebanon by Kuwait.

All eyes will turn Sunday to what might be issued by the Arab foreign ministers meeting in Kuwait regarding Lebanon’s response to the Gulf paper of demands.

President Michel Aoun on Saturday visited Dar al-Fatwa in Beirut and met with Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Latif Daryan.

Lebanon’s crisis is increasingly forcing young people to drop out of learning and engage in ill-paid, irregular and informal work "just to survive and help feed their families," UNICEF said in a report released Friday.

The report – Searching for Hope – says that more than 4 in 10 youth in Lebanon reduced spending on education to buy basic food, medicine and other essential items, and 3 in 10 stopped their education altogether.

The Trade and Investment Facilitation (TIF) activity, funded by The United States Agency for International Development (USAID), has launched an export promotion initiative to assist 15 Lebanese wineries to conform with regulatory and market requirements to export wines to the state of Texas in the United States.

The launch event, entitled “Wine from Lebanon: Exporting Lebanese Wine to the United States”, was held in the presence of USAID Lebanon Mission Director Eileen Devitt, the Minister of Economy and Trade Amin Salam, representatives of the 15 wineries, and other stakeholders in the wine industry. 

U.S. Special Envoy and Coordinator for International Energy Affairs Amos Hochstein will return to Lebanon in the middle of next week carrying a new proposal, media reports said.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati held talks Friday at the Grand Serail with Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Latif Daryan.

Cabinet held a session Friday morning that was dedicated to continuing the discussion of the draft state budget.