Parliament speaker Nabih Berri has renewed his call on political blocs to engage in dialogue to elect a president before the end of September, after 10 months of presidential void.

Crisis-hit Lebanon has been without a president since Michel Aoun's term ended in October last year, with neither of the two main blocs -- Hezbollah and its opponents -- having the majority required to elect one.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday called for a dialogue "without prejudgments."

Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has met with Islamic Jihad leader Ziad Nakhalah and Hamas deputy politburo head Sheikh Saleh al-Arouri, Hezbollah said on Saturday.

The ongoing dialogue between Hezbollah and the Free Patriotic Movement has made progress and the FPM has proposed an administrative decentralization plan based on dividing Lebanon into 30 administrative districts, a media report said on Saturday.

Iran's foreign minister has rejected accusations from France over Tehran's interference in Lebanon, urging President Emmanuel Macron to focus instead on his own country.

Macron had told a conference of French ambassadors earlier this week that a "key element" to resolve Lebanon's political crisis was "the clarification of regional interference, including that of Iran."

Kataeb Party chief Sami Gemayel on Friday rejected Speaker Nabih Berri’s call for dialogue that would precede open sessions for the election of a president.

“The proposal to hold successive sessions to elect a president on the condition that we participate in dialogue is an acknowledgment that you were deliberately violating the constitution and that all the excuses that you were using are invalid,” Gemayel said in a post on the X social media platform.

A Qatari delegate will visit Lebanon prior to French envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian’s upcoming trip to the country, al-Jadeed TV reported.

“This points to the disunity of the five-nation committee, seeing as the Qataris and Americans are not betting on the French initiative,” al-Jadeed added.

U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein who oversaw a maritime border deal between Lebanon and Israel, countries technically still at war, has said it was time to delineate their land border also.

"It's time for us to review the framework, and the framework envisioned... to achieve an outcome of a maritime boundary and to work on the land peace as well," Hochstein told reporters in Beirut.

Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil has expressed optimism about a presidential dialogue which might take place in September, as he again called for decentralization, creating a trust fund and completing the Central Bank forensic audit.

In a speech Thursday, Bassil said the FPM had a clear condition to participate in a dialogue suggested by French envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian.

On August 1, 2023, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) awarded a contract to RTI International, a nonprofit research institute and leading international development organization, to implement the new five-year $96.9M Quality Instruction Towards Access and Basic Education Improvement (QITABI) 3 to support Lebanon’s education system.

In collaboration with the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE) and the Center for Educational Research and Development (CRDP), USAID’s QITABI 3 will improve literacy, numeracy, social and emotional learning (SEL), and inclusive education outcomes for students nationwide. The project will also provide life skills and career guidance to students at the intermediate and secondary levels.