The United Nations and U.S. have “strongly condemned” the double suicide bombing that targeted an Iranian cultural center in Beirut's southern suburbs.

The 15-member Security Council “strongly condemned” Wednesday's attack in the Bir Hassan neighborhood and “reaffirmed that terrorism in all its forms and manifestations constitutes one of the most serious threats to international peace and security.”

A fire swept through seven tents in a Syrian refugee camp in the southern city of Tyre, causing only material damage, the state-run National News Agency reported on Sunday.

According to the news agency, Civil Defense teams controlled the blaze and prevented it from reaching other tents.

Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri stressed Friday his rejection of any president who might be in the service of any foreign “tutelage” and urged Speaker Nabih Berri to convince Hizbullah to withdraw its fighters from Syria and start implementing the Baabda Declaration.

“As the Mustaqbal Movement refuses to be at the image of Hizbullah, we refuse to be at the image of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) or al-Nusra Front, and refuse any call to involve the movement and Sunnis in Lebanon in the war between Hizbullah and al-Qaida,” Hariri said in a speech via video link that was broadcast during a rally organized by the March 14 forces to commemorate the ninth anniversary of the assassination of ex-PM Rafik Hariri.

March 14's MPs announced Friday that they have decided to submit to U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon a petition demanding the expansion of the jurisdiction of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon to cover all the assassinations that targeted March 14 figures after Dec. 12, 2005 – the day MP Gebran Tueni was murdered.

The announcement was made during a mass rally commemorating the ninth anniversary of former premier Rafik Hariri's assassination at the BIEL exhibition center in Beirut.

High-level Russian and U.S. diplomats have promised to help unblock the deadlocked Syria peace talks in Geneva, U.N. mediator Lakhdar Brahimi said Thursday.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov and U.S. Under Secretary of State Wendy Sherman "promised that they will help both here and in their capitals ... to unblock the situation for us," Brahimi told reporters following a meeting with the two diplomats.

The Special Tribunal for Lebanon suspended on Wednesday its sessions after the case of fifth suspect Hassan Merhi was joined to that of the four already convicted fugitives.

"We will announce the date of the upcoming session once Merhi's defense team has prepared all the necessary documents and is ready to take part in the trials,” STL Presiding Judge David Re announced.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Tuesday challenged rivals in the Hizbullah-led camp to endorse the recent charter issued by Bkirki as a “national program of action,” noting that some parties have only voiced “verbal support” for the document.

“The Bkirki charter reminded me of the famous Bkirki declaration,” said Geagea at a press conference he held at his Maarab headquarters.

Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun on Tuesday reiterated that the formation of a so-called “de facto cabinet” would violate the 1943 National Pact, an unwritten agreement that laid the foundation of Lebanon as a multi-confessional state.

“What's dangerous in the cabinet formation process is that it is based on incomplete consultations that excluded the biggest Christian parliamentary bloc,” Aoun said in a written statement he recited after the weekly meeting of the Change and Reform parliamentary bloc.

King Abdullah Monday decreed jail terms of up to 20 years for belonging to "terrorist groups" and fighting abroad, as it struggles to deter Islamist Saudis from becoming jihadists.

"Taking part in combat outside the kingdom, in any form" will be punished by jail terms of between three and 20 years, said the decree published by state news agency SPA.

The United Nations deplored the deadly blast that hit the Bekaa town of Hermel on Saturday evening, stressing that embracing the military institution is “the only way to face these random terrorist actions.”

"We strongly condemn the car bombing in Hermel which killed and wounded a number of people,” U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly said in a released statement.