AUKAR.- An armed man who attacked the embassy of USA near Beirut was killed and captured on Wednesday morning after a shootout in which a security guard at the compound was wounded, according to the Lebanese army and diplomatic mission officials.
The incident occurred at a time of high tensions in the small Mediterranean country, where months of fighting between Hezbollah insurgents and the Israeli army have displaced thousands of people along the border, after years of political stalemate and crisis. economical.
The local press reported a shootout with at least one attacker that lasted almost half an hour.
Joe Abdo, who works at a gas station near the diplomatic complex, said he heard “between 15 and 20 shots” while working in the morning. “We ran here to see what was happening and suddenly the army blocked us,” he told The Associated Press.
The motive for the attack was not immediately clear. Lebanese media published photos that appeared to show a bloodied attacker wearing a black vest with the words “Islamic State” written in Arabic and the initials “I” and “S” in English.
A Lebanese security official and two judicial officials familiar with the case said the attacker appeared to be a lone wolf and identified him as a resident of the border town of Majdal Anjar, near Syria. Earlier, the military had said the suspect was a Syrian national.
The army searched both Majdal Anjar and the nearby town of Suweiri, where they detained relatives of the suspect, but found no additional gunmen or evidence of the existence of a possible extremist cell, added the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they had no information. authorization to inform the press.
The suspect was shot in the stomach and leg before being captured and taken to Beirut military hospital, they added.
An embassy spokesperson later explained in a statement that one of its security guards was injured in the incident.
“Out of respect for his privacy, we cannot say more, but we wish him a full recovery,” said the spokesperson, who spoke on condition of anonymity in compliance with embassy rules.
The office of interim Prime Minister Najib Mikati said in a statement that after meetings with the defense minister and the army commander, he was informed that the situation was stable and that rigorous investigations were underway.
The army, for its part, said it deployed troops around the embassy and in its immediate vicinity.
In 1983, a bomb killed 63 people at Washington’s diplomatic legation in Beirut in an attack that U.S. officials blame on the Lebanese insurgent group Hezbollah.
After that incident, the embassy was moved from the center of the capital to the Christian suburb of Aukar, in the north. On September 20, 1984, it suffered another bomb attack at the new location.
In September 2023, Lebanese security forces arrested a Lebanese man who opened fire on the diplomatic compound, causing no injuries.
A month later, hundreds of protesters clashed with security forces near the embassy during demonstrations in support of the people of Gaza and the insurgent group Hamas in its war with Israel.
Source: With information from AP
