US Begins Evacuating Some Personnel From Beirut Embassy As Iran War Looms

When it comes to the Middle East and rising tensions, the most watched US diplomatic compound in the whole region is the American embassy in Beirut.

When things get hot, or America is at war, the threat level is always raised here first – given also that it has in the past been attacked, especially in the early 1980s with suicide bombings.

Now with potential war with Iran looming, the US State Department is taking no chances, also given Iran’s main proxy group, Lebanese Hezbollah, is very active in the capital. If the US were to attack Tehran, it’s entirely possible that Hezbollah could in turn hit American interests in Lebanon.

On Monday, a senior State Dept official conformed the order has gone out for the departure of non-emergency personnel at the embassy in Beirut.

“We continuously assess the security environment, and based on our latest review, we determined it prudent to reduce our footprint to essential personnel,” the US official told Al Jazeera.

“The Embassy remains operational with core staff in place,” the source detailed. “This is a temporary measure intended to ensure the safety of our personnel while maintaining our ability to operate and assist US citizens.”

Again, the heightened precautions are seen as especially necessary in a place like Beirut, which decades ago even saw the American ambassador assassinated. According to a US State Dept outline of past events:

Deteriorating security conditions during Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war resulted in a gradual reduction of Embassy functions and the departure of dependents and many staff. Ambassador Meloy was assassinated in 1976.

In the early hours of October 23, 1983, a suicide bomber attacked members of the Multinational Force, peacekeepers at the U.S. Marine barracks and the French paratrooper barracks.  241 American marines, sailors and soldiers died, and 128 were wounded.

Following an April 1983 suicide bomb attack on the Embassy in Beirut, in which 49 Embassy staff were killed and 34 were injured, the Embassy relocated to Awkar, north of the capital. A second bombing there, in September 1984, killed 11 and injured 58. In September 1989, the Embassy closed and all American staff were evacuated, due to security threats. The Embassy re-opened in November 1990.

The embassy has endured long periods of time in the last many decades when it had reduced staff or wasn’t at fully normal operations, with the State Dept saying that over years it has “undergone an incremental process of reestablishing normal functions.”

The last time there was a major security incident was in June 2024, when a gunman was shot by Lebanese security forces after the armed man fired at the US Embassy. At least one embassy security guard was injured in the attack. It was a suspected terror operation by the Islamic State, based on evidence at the scene.