The International Monetary Fund said Thursday that crisis-hit Lebanon faces a tough path and further economic contraction in 2021, assuring that the fund is ready to assist Lebanon as soon as a government is formed.

“The only country at immediate risk of further economic contraction across the Mideast this year is Lebanon,” Jihad Azour, director of the Middle East and Central Asia department at the IMF said.

A prominent Lebanese publisher and vocal critic of Hizbullah was found dead in his car Thursday morning from multiple gunshots at close range, security and forensic officials said.

Lokman Slim, a 58-year-old longtime Shiite political activist and researcher, had been missing for hours since late Wednesday and his family posted social media messages looking for him. He was visiting friends in a southern village and was expected back in Beirut the same day.

A U.S. State Department spokesman reportedly said that the Caesar Act imposed in 2019 is “not going to target Lebanon's economy or it people,” the Saudi Asharq el-Awsat reported on Thursday.

Ten detainees have been referred to the military prosecution over their suspected involvement in the latest unrest in Tripoli, the army said on Wednesday.

Armed members of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party on Wednesday seized control of the SSNP department’s office in the northern city of Batroun, amid a dispute between rival factions over the legitimacy of the party’s latest internal elections.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi held talks Wednesday in Bkirki with U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Dorothy Shea.

The Israeli army said anti-aircraft fire targeted one of its drones over south Lebanon on Wednesday, as Lebanese media reports said that Hizbullah fired a surface-to-air missile at the drone.

Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi on Wednesday voiced continued support for crisis-hit Lebanon during his meeting with PM-designate Saad Hariri in Cairo, stressing that a Lebanese government should be formed soon to face the challenges.

Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea on Wednesday reiterated calls for an “international investigation committee” into the port blast, stressing that the truth behind the “crime shall not be erased.”

Speaker Nabih Berri dispatched on Wednesday a delegation of AMAL Movement to the northern city of Tripoli that witnessed recent clashes between protesters and security forces, and the burning of its historic municipal building.