Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri confirmed Monday to Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper that Lebanon is still committed to what was agreed upon with American mediator Amos Hochstein regarding a path that leads to a ceasefire with Israel and the implementation of U.N. resolution 1701.

Berri said he had agreed on a ceasefire initiative with Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed by an Israeli airstrike on Friday, and that the agreement is still "in effect."

Iran lost its most reliable ally in the Middle East when an Israeli airstrike killed Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah. But Iran isn't leading the charge to retaliate.

"By the grace and power of God, Lebanon will make the transgressing, malicious enemy regret its actions," Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in the wake of Nasrallah's death Friday. But the 85-year-old paramount ruler in Iran gave no mention of his country taking action over the death of a man he once praised as "an exceptional face in the world of Islam" after the Israel-Hezbollah war in 2006.

Germany sent an air force plane to strife-torn Lebanon on Monday to fly out some Beirut embassy staff and their dependents as well as German citizens with medical conditions, the government said.

"An Air Force A321 aircraft flew to Beirut today to support the departure of the colleagues and their families," said a joint statement by the foreign and defense ministries. "German nationals who are particularly at risk due to medical circumstances are also being taken on the Bundeswehr aircraft."

The world is safer after Israel's killing of Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the top U.S. diplomat said Monday, describing the Iran-backed Lebanese group's leader as a "brutal terrorist."

"The region, the world are safer without him," Antony Blinken said, even as he insisted that "diplomacy remains the best and only path to achieving greater stability in the Middle East" and vowed the United States would continue working "urgently" to secure a ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza.

The Israeli military said on Monday its forces killed at least two leaders of a left-wing Palestinian armed group, hours after the organization said its members were hit in a strike in central Beirut.

Israeli fighter jets "struck and eliminated the terrorist" Mohammad Abdel-Aal, head of the Lebanon branch of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the military said in a statement.

Israeli special forces have been carrying out small, targeted raids into southern Lebanon, gathering intelligence and probing ahead of a possible broader ground incursion that could come as soon as this week, people familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal.

Lebanon's health ministry said an Israeli strike Monday killed six rescuers with the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee in the Bekaa Valley in the country's east.

An "enemy strike on the civil defense center of the Islamic Health Committee killed six emergency personnel and wounded four others" in the town of Sohmor, the ministry in a statement, condemning Israel's "targeting of rescue services".

Lebanon said Monday that an Israeli strike a day earlier near the southern city of Sidon killed 45 people, raising an earlier toll.

In a statement, the health ministry announced "45 dead and 70 wounded in an updated toll for the Israeli enemy attack on Ain al-Delb" on Sunday, while the official National News Agency said the strike targeted a building which completely collapsed.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Monday strongly hinted that Israel is preparing to launch a ground offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“The elimination of (Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan) Nasrallah is a very important step, but it is not everything. We will use all the capabilities we have,” Gallant said to troops of the 188th Armored Brigade and Golani Infantry Brigade in northern Israel.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati announced Monday that Lebanon is ready to implement Resolution 1701 and send the army immediately to the area south of Litani should there be a ceasefire.

“We stressed our stance on the implementation of the statement issued by the U.S. and a number of European and Arab countries that called for a ceasefire and launching discussions over the implementation of Resolution 1701, and we accept everything that was mentioned in the statement,” Mikati added.