Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil visited Friday President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, Speaker Nabih Berri and Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, in a series of meetings aimed at averting civil strife.

Bassil urged all Lebanese to maintain a patriotic stance and spare their children the bitterness of internal conflict. "One hundred days of foreign war are better than a single day of civil war — though we want neither," he said, as he accused certain domestic actors of seeking an internal conflict as a means to end the Israeli aggression, a clear reference to the FPM’s long-standing rivals, the Lebanese Forces.