Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji has said that the government’s “top priority” is Hezbollah’s disarmament, noting that the government took six months to reach a firm decision on undertaking this task.

“It was late, but the government is committed,” Rajji said in a Zoom interview with The Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

The United States Embassy in Beirut said Wednesday that it welcomes the reform steps undertaken by Prime Minister Nawaf Salam's government, including the Cabinet’s approval of the gap law.

In a statement, the embassy said the gap law would help restore the confidence of international financial institutions, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, in the Lebanese economy and support its recovery.

President Joseph Aoun told visiting U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix that Lebanon welcomes any country wishing to maintain forces in the south after UNIFIL's withdrawal in 2027.

"These forces will assist the Lebanese army, which will be increasing its personnel in the coming weeks," Aoun said Wednesday after he met Lacroix.

The Association of Banks in Lebanon announced Monday that the government’s draft law on financial regulation and deposit recovery was issued “without any serious study of the figures required for its implementation.”

“If it were serious, the draft law should have been preceded by determining the size of the deficit, how it will affect the Central Bank of Lebanon and the banks, an accurate assessment of non-performing assets, the amount of funds required to repay the various deposit categories, and verification of the availability of the necessary liquidity,” ABL added in a statement after a meeting.

The Israeli army is preparing for fighting on four fronts -- Iran, Yemen, Lebanon and Gaza, an Israeli media report said.

The report, published Monday in Maariv, claimed that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held Sunday a security meeting that discussed Lebanon and the army's defense and attack readiness on all fronts.

The day after elite U.S. forces captured Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that Hezbollah will no longer have alleged operations in the South American state.

Speaking to CBS television, Rubio said: "It's very simple, OK? In the 21st century, under the Trump administration, we are not going to have a country like Venezuela in our own hemisphere, in the sphere of control and the crossroads for Hezbollah, for Iran and for every other malign influence in the world. That's just not gonna exist."

Cabinet will meet on Thursday to discuss the army's progress in disarming Hezbollah south of the Litani River.

The ceasefire monitoring committee -- comprising Lebanon, Israel, the United States, France and U.N. peacekeepers -- is also set to meet this week.

Despite Israeli strikes on the south of the country, people in Lebanon were enjoying winter weather and snow over the weekend.

Lebanese and tourists took to the slopes to ski resorts northeast of Beirut, rode chairlifts and sleds over the snow-covered slopes in Faraya and Kfardebian, snowboarded and skied, while others along Beirut's coastline were swimming and enjoying the sun.

Israel's Foreign Minister Gideon Saar has acknowledged on X that the Lebanese government and army had made efforts to disarm Hezbollah but said "they are far from sufficient".

Saar met Sunday with U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert.

Hezbollah chief Sheikh Naim Qassem has said that his party wants Lebanon to be "sovereign, free, independent and capable."