Israel's recently retired spy chief, Meir Dagan, has said that the Jewish state would be better off if Syrian President Bashar Assad was toppled because “this will stop help to Hizbullah,” Israeli media reported Sunday.

Dagan also told a weekend conference that Assad’s fall would strengthen the Sunni camp in Syria and in the Arab world in general. “These things will be good for Israel strategically.”

Bahrain's military prosecutor accused 21 political activists of seeking to overthrow the ruling monarchy with the help of a “foreign terrorist group” — an apparent reference to Hizbullah — in a widening crackdown on a pro-reform uprising by the island nation's Shiite majority.

The charges are part of fast-moving efforts by Bahrain's authorities to prosecute opposition leaders and others after months of clashes and protests in the strategic kingdom, which is home to the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet. Late last month, a special security court set up under martial law sentenced four people to death for killing two policemen in the unrest.

Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat has called for the consolidation of the military institution, saying Lebanon would not exist without the unity of the nation and the army.

“There is no Lebanon without the unity of the country and the military institution,” Jumblat told a delegation headed by retired Maj. Gen. Shawki al-Masri that visited him in Mukhtara on Saturday.

Premier-designate Najib Miqati’s circles have confirmed that the billionaire businessman met with Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah last month.

“They met almost a month ago,” the circles told the Kuwaiti al-Anbaa daily in response to a question if the two men were planning to hold talks soon.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday prayed that Lebanon comes out of its crisis and hoped that the relationship between officials would be based on mutual respect.

During a mass at the Harissa basilica, al-Rahi expressed hope that Lebanese officials would use their conscience to end the government formation impasse that is “paralyzing constitutional institutions” and drowning Lebanon in an economic crisis.

Officials involved in the formation of the new government are mulling new names to head the interior ministry after President Michel Suleiman and Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun failed to agree on who would name the minister.

High-ranking March 8 sources told pan-Arab daily al-Hayat on Sunday that some parties suggested naming Ghaleb Ghanem, the former head of the Higher Judicial Council, as interior minister given that he is Maronite and a neutral personality.

Estonia has pressured the European Union to hold off sanctioning Syrian President Bashar Assad “to protect” seven Estonian tourists who were kidnapped in eastern Lebanon in March, An Nahar daily reported Sunday.

The newspaper said that Estonia pressured its European partners over fears on the safety of the seven men who were last seen on March 23, when they went missing in the Bekaa Valley after entering Lebanon from Syria on a cycling trip.

Former Prime Minister Fouad Saniora demanded on Friday that the United States maintain its support to the Lebanese army by continuing on providing it with proper equipment.

He made his statements before a number of American officials at the end of his trip to the U.S.

The Higher Islamic Legal Council questioned on Saturday the ongoing governmental vacuum in Lebanon, attributing it to the accumulation of “contradictory demands and conditions that violate national consensus and the constitution.”

It called in a statement, after a meeting headed by Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani, for “committing to national principles that the Lebanese asserted in the Taif Accord.”

The Interior Ministry announced on Saturday that a delegation from the interior and justice ministries visited Roumieh prison in order to listen to the demands of inmates who had gone on hunger strike on Friday.

It said in a statement: “These demands included issuing a general pardon, speeding up trials, tackling prison overcrowding, improving the quality of food, and increasing the number of doctors at the jail.”