Fierce confrontations erupted Monday evening in the northern city of Tripoli as angry anti-government protesters vandalized the facades of several banks and torched an army vehicle.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea announced Monday that he does not regret nominating President Michel Aoun for the presidency prior to his election and voiced caution over the possibility of toppling Hassan Diab's government.

The Association of Banks in Lebanon on Monday condemned the latest violent attacks against some banks and “the personal threats that targeted some banks' chairmen and board members.”

Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh on Monday confirmed that he will address the Lebanese on Wednesday about the country's dire financial crisis.

President Michel Aoun announced Monday that “any confrontation against corruption cannot be temporary, partial or selective” so that corrupts do not “seek the protection of religious or political leaders to dodge accountability.”

Scattered anti-government protests broke out in several parts of Lebanon on Monday amid a crash in the local currency and a surge in food prices, leading to road closures that prevented medical teams from setting out from Beirut to conduct coronavirus tests across the country.

The Health Ministry said its teams would try again on Tuesday, urging protesters to let the paramedics work to evaluate the spread of the virus in the tiny country of 5 million people.

Lebanon recorded three new cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic raising the total to 710, the Health Ministry said on Monday.

Lebanon's currency continued its downward spiral against the dollar on Monday, as money exchange houses failed to abide by the Central Bank’s Sunday memo setting the rate at LBP 3,200 for dollars.

Israeli warplanes staged at dawn on Monday heavy” mock raids over the southern city of Sidon, said the State-run National News Agency.

Israeli troops also resumed installations of surveillance cameras on the Palestinian-Lebanese border near Fatima Gate in Kfar Kila on Sunday, said NNA.

Iraq is planning painful cuts in social benefits relied on by millions of government workers. Saudi Arabia will likely have to delay mega-projects. Egypt and Lebanon face a blow as their workers in the Gulf send back less of the much-needed dollars that help keep their fragile economies afloat.

The historic crash in oil prices in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic is reverberating across the Middle East as crude-dependent countries scramble to offset losses from a key source of state revenue — and all this at a time when several of them already face explosive social unrest.