South Korea's military began a major live-fire exercise Monday amid high tensions sparked by North Korea's deadly bombardment last month, as Washington pressed Beijing to curb its unruly ally Pyongyang.

The South, smarting over the unprecedented shelling of a civilian area, dismissed claims by the North that the five-day drill could spark war.

Prime Minister Saad Hariri told former U.S. Ambassador Michele Sison he feared another war with Israel would mean the "death" of his pro-Western March 14 alliance, leaked cables showed Monday.

A document reportedly obtained by whistleblowing website WikiLeaks and published on the website of local daily al-Akhbar quoted Hariri as saying he believed Hizbullah would rise again should there be another round of violence.

A major fire, which erupted in the town of Fatri in the Jbeil region a week ago, has threatened to reach the houses in the area after having had destroyed 150,000 square meters of land, the head of the municipality Imad Daou told AFP on Sunday.

"Eighty percent of the land in the town has been destroyed. The entire town is on fire starting from the river and reaching the valley, and even the mountain. There aren't enough fire department teams to control the blaze," he told AFP in a phone call.

Israel's plan to pull its troops out of northern Ghajar, a disputed village on the flashpoint border with Lebanon, is likely to prove more of a headache than a political victory for Beirut, experts say.

"The people of Ghajar do not want to be part of Lebanon," said Timur Goksel, former senior adviser of the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), of the village's 2,200 residents -- none of whom is Lebanese.

An indictment of Hizbullah members in connection with the murder of ex-premier Rafik Hariri could forever tarnish the party's image as a resistance movement and threaten its raison d'etre, analysts say.

"Whether one single member or 100 are implicated makes absolutely no difference, Hizbullah won't accept it" said Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, a political analyst at the Doha-based Arab Institute for Research and Policy Studies.

Saudi King Abdullah, 86, is to undergo more surgery on his back in the United States Friday, the royal court said.

"King Abdullah will return for surgery to repair several vertebrae in his spine in a follow-up to his previous treatment.... in accordance with the plan set by his medical team," the court said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

Israeli forces killed several armed Palestinians planning a "terror attack" as they approached the northern border fence of the Gaza Strip, the military said on Thursday.

"IDF (Israel Defense Forces) thwarts terror attack in northern Gaza," a statement from the military said.

Donors and investors have pledged 3.55 billion dollars for the development of resource-rich but neglected east Sudan, officials said on Thursday at the end of a two-day conference in Kuwait City.

"Total pledges made by participants in the east Sudan donors and investors forum came at 3.55 billion dollars," said Mustafa Osman Ismail, an advisor to the Sudanese president and head of the organizing committee.