Two Lebanese army personnel were killed Thursday after an Israeli drone that had crashed in the country's south exploded, the latest deadly incident for Lebanese troops near the Israeli border.

Under a November ceasefire that sought to end more than a year of hostilities including two months of open war between Israel and Hezbollah, Lebanon's army has been deploying in the country's south and dismantling the Iran-backed group's infrastructure there with the support of U.N. peacekeepers.

In a wooded valley close to the Israeli border, United Nations peacekeepers showed AFP journalists a Hezbollah bunker they had uncovered in southern Lebanon, a former bastion of the militant group.

The U.N. Security Council is set to vote Thursday on the future of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which faces U.S. and Israeli opposition.

The Lebanese cabinet session scheduled for September 2 to discuss the Lebanese Army’s plan for disarming Hezbollah and the other armed groups will be held on time, a highly informed Lebanese source told Asharq al-Awsat newspaper.

The source, however, did not rule out a brief postponement of the session should domestic complications arise .

A Lebanese leader and a Lebanese party official have reached an agreement on the Lebanese Army’s plan for disarming Hezbollah that will be presented to Cabinet on September 2, informed sources said.

The plan will be implemented over two phases: “the first in the South Litani region, where the government will fully implement Resolution 1701 without objection from Hezbollah,” the sources told the al-Anbaa news portal.

Palestinian groups in three refugee camps in south Lebanon handed over heavy weapons to the Lebanese army on Thursday, under a disarmament deal reached earlier this year, Lebanese and Palestinian authorities said.

During a visit to Beirut in May, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun agreed that weapons in Lebanon's Palestinian camps would be handed over to the Lebanese authorities.

French President Emmanuel Macron told Thursday President Joseph Aoun, in a phone call, that the army's plan for arms monopolization will receive "broad European and international support" and must be characterized with "accuracy."

Macron and Aoun discussed the plan that the army will develop to implement the Cabinet's decision to disarm Hezbollah and other armed factions. Macron lauded the step as "important", said it should be done with precision, and assured that the plan will have broad European and international support.

Israeli airstrikes on Thursday targeted the al-Zighrin area on the eastern outskirts of the Jezzine district town of al-Rihan, the National News Agency said.

The stream of the al-Khardali River was also targeted by several airstrikes in the al-Mahmoudiyeh area, NNA added.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has reportedly warned against confronting the Lebanese Army.

“Whoever throws (even a) rose at the Lebanese Army is a dog, a son of a dog, and this is the stance of the Amal and Hezbollah duo,” LBCI television quoted visitors of Berri as saying.

After his remarks sparked outrage in Lebanon and beyond, U.S. envoy Tom Barrack has offered an indirect apology to Lebanese journalists who were offended by his chiding remarks at the Baabda Palace, saying his use of the word “animalistic” was not meant to be voiced in “a derogatory manner.”

“I’m just saying, ‘Can we calm down, can we find some tolerance, some kindness. Yeah, let’s be, let’s be civilized.’ But it was inappropriate to do when the media is just doing their job,” Barrack said in an interview with Mario Nawfal on the X platform.

The Security Council scheduled a vote Thursday on a resolution that would end the more than four-decade operation of the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon on Dec. 31, 2026.

Two council diplomats said late Wednesday that the United States, which had been demanding that the force known as UNIFIL be terminated in a year, did not object to a French draft resolution with that end date in 16 months.