english.alaraby.co.uk — Lebanese songstress Haifa Wehbe, who has previously courted controversy for performances deemed too sexy, will be performing in the Gulf kingdom …

By Jamie Prentis -- thenationalnews. -- Lebanese politicians failed for a third time to elect the country's next president on Thursday with no candidate receiving enough votes, only 11 days before the term of incumbent Michel Aoun ends. Parliamentary speaker Nabih Berri said the next election session in the 128-seat chamber would take place on Monday. In the first polling round, which took place in late September, a two-thirds majority was required to win. But an absolute majority is needed in subsequent votes. Of the 119 votes cast, 55 were blank and 17 for “New Lebanon”. MP Michel Moawad, who received the most votes in the first round with 36, increased his share to 42 — but that was nowhere near the threshold needed to be elected Lebanon's next president. “It is clear that one camp comes to elect a president while another attends the sessions just to hide its desire to block them,” said Mr Moawad, a staunch critic of the Iran-backed armed group and political party Hezbollah.

Will the Lebanon-Israel maritime gas deal shore up Aoun's legacy? Mr Moawad, whose father Rene served as president for 18 days in 1989 before being assassinated, described himself as the only “serious candidate”. He has received the support of parliament's largest party, the Lebanese Forces, the Kataeb Party, the Druze Progressive Socialist Party and a handful of independent MPs. Among the big names not to back a candidate yet are Hezbollah, Mr Berri's Amal Movement, and the Free Patriotic Movement, which was founded by Mr Aoun.

By Laila Bassam & Maya Gebailey -- BEIRUT, (Reuters) -Before Lebanon's government approved a U.S.-brokered deal settling a decades-long maritime boundary dispute with Israel, the powerful Hezbollah had scrutinized the final draft line by line and given a crucial nod of acceptance. Branded a terrorist group by Washington and a sworn enemy of Israel, the Iran-backed Hezbollah was certainly nowhere near the negotiating room during U.S. shuttle diplomacy which clinched the landmark deal last week. But behind the scenes, the heavily armed group was being briefed on the details and expressing its views even as it threatened military action were Lebanon's interests not secured, according to sources familiar with Hezbollah's thinking, a Lebanese official and a Western source familiar with the process.

An unprecedented compromise between the enemy states, the deal opens the way for offshore energy exploration and defuses one source of potential conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. Observers say the deal was all the more significant for the pragmatism shown by Hezbollah, pointing to the shifting priorities of a group set up four decades ago by Iran's Revolutionary Guards to fight Israel. "The Hezbollah leadership scrutinized the understanding line by line before agreeing to it," said one of the sources familiar with the group's thinking.

After spending much of the last decade deploying fighters and military expertise across the Middle East to help Iran's allies, notably President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, Hezbollah's focus is today squarely on Lebanon - a country in deep crisis. More involved than ever in state affairs, Hezbollah has said offshore oil and gas are the only way for Lebanon to emerge from a devastating financial meltdown that has hit all Lebanese hard, including its large Shi'ite constituency. Though Hezbollah says it does not fear war with Israel, the group has also said it does not seek one with a formidable foe which staged major invasions of Lebanon in 1978 and 1982. Lebanon took years to rebuild from the last war in 2006 - much of the bill paid by Gulf Arabs who have since shunned Beirut because of Hezbollah's sway. And while Tehran's support remains strong, Western sanctions have squeezed the amount of cash Iran can send the group.

by bolnews.com — The Lebanese parliament passed a new set of modifications to a financial secrecy law on Thursday after the International …