UNIFIL Head of Mission and Force Commander Major General Michael Beary on Thursday inspected the Blue Line area, south of al-Naqoura, where Israel has started to build a controversial separation border wall that Lebanon says would encroach on its territory.

Israel has started constructing the wall along its border with Lebanon on Wednesday. Lebanon's Higher Defense Council met afterward and instructed the Lebanese Armed Forces to confront any Israeli territorial or maritime border violations.

President Michel Aoun has signed on Thursday the officers’ promotion decree of the army, security forces, general security, state security and customs.

The signing comes one day after State officials, Aoun, Speaker Nabih Berri and PM Saad Hariri, agreed to end a row over an officers seniority decree by signing a new decree merging the disputed decree with the stalled promotions decree.

Beirut airport police arrested a drug-smuggler female after seizing ample amounts of narcotic that she hid in boxes of sweets, the National News Agency reported on Thursday.

NNA said that the police searched the woman's luggage and found the drugs packed and hidden in sweets boxes.

Israel on Wednesday started constructing a controversial wall along its border with Lebanon, a barrier that Lebanon says would encroach on its territory.

Andrea Tenenti, spokesperson for the United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon known as UNIFIL, confirmed the beginning of works in the Naqoura area and said the force is "fully engaged with both parties in order to find common solutions."

Officials on Wednesday started signing a new decree merging the disputed officers seniority decree with the stalled promotions decree, TV networks said.

“As part of the solution that was agreed on in yesterday's tripartite meeting at the Baabda Palace, the promotions and the seniority decrees have been combined and the relevant officials have started signing the new decree,” LBCI television reported.

In memory of Rebecca Dykes, the slain UK Embassy employee, a commemoration ceremony was held Wednesday at the Mar Elias Church in Beirut's Kantari area.

The service was attended by British Ambassador to Lebanon Hugo Shorter, embassy staff and Rebecca's family. Also present were Minister of State for Women's Affairs Jean Oghassabian representing President Michel Aoun and Prime Minister Saad Hariri, MP Yassine Jaber representing Speaker Nabih Berri, Brig. Gen. Omar Murad representing Army chief General Joseph Aoun and Defense Minister Yaacoub Sarraf, Col. Imad Dimashkiyeh representing General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim, General Elias Toubaji representing ISF chief Maj. Gen. Imad Othman, in addition to ambassadors, ministers, embassy friends, and partner organizations with which Rebecca worked during her time in Lebanon.

A Hizbullah supporter was handed over to security forces Tuesday evening after he shot and wounded two men during a personal dispute in the Aley District town of Aramoun, the National News Agency said.

NNA said the shooter, identified as Hajj Abu Fadi Nael, was handed over after the Progressive Socialist Party's leadership and MP Akram Shehayyeb communicated with Hizbullah, which “lifted the political cover off” the man.

A Lebanese judge on Tuesday accepted to look into a lawsuit filed against firebrand Saudi State Minister for Gulf Affairs Thamer al-Sabhan, who was in charge of the Lebanon file during Prime Minister Saad Hariri's resignation crisis.

“Beirut First Examining Magistrate Ghassan Oueidat has decided to accept the lawsuit filed by liberated captive Nabih Awada through his lawyer Hassan Bazzi against Saudi State Minister for Gulf Affairs Thamer al-Sabhan on charges of sowing discord among the Lebanese, inciting them to strife and disrupting Lebanon's ties with a foreign state,” the National News Agency said.

Al-Mustaqbal parliamentary bloc on Tuesday stressed “Lebanon's ultimate right to sign an agreement for exploration and drilling in Block 9,” describing the offshore gas block as “an inseparable part of Lebanon's Exclusive Economic Zone.”

“Lebanon had long ago and according to norms informed the U.N. and international authorities of the borders of its EEZ,” the bloc reminded in a statement issued after its weekly meeting.

The Change and Reform parliamentary bloc on Tuesday called on its ally Hizbullah to “show the same level of commitment to the principle of building the state.”

“On the anniversary of the memorandum of understanding between the Free Patriotic Movement and Hizbullah, the belief is deepening day after day that the two giants who signed this agreement had foreseen the major national necessities that required this understanding,” said the bloc in a statement issued after its weekly meeting.