A suicide bomber in a car attacks the U.S. embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing twenty-two people.
On September 20, 1984, a suicide bomber attacked the United States Embassy annex in Aukar, a Christian suburb northeast of Beirut, Lebanon. The annex had become the main base for American diplomatic operations after the original U.S. Embassy in Beirut was devastated by a truck bomb in April 1983. In the 1984 attack, a van packed with explosives sped toward the compound and came under fire from security personnel before detonating near the entrance. The explosion caused extensive damage to the embassy building and nearby structures. U.S. government historical records report that 23 people were killed, while contemporary and later accounts differ somewhat on the final casualty total.
The bombing occurred during the Lebanese Civil War, when Beirut had become a center of conflict involving Lebanese militias, Palestinian organizations, Israel, Syria, Iran and Western powers. American facilities had already suffered several major attacks, including the April 1983 embassy bombing and the October 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks, which killed 241 American military personnel. The FBI has subsequently attributed the 1983 embassy and Marine barracks bombings, as well as the 1984 embassy annex attack, to Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militant organization that developed with substantial Iranian support.
The September 1984 bombing demonstrated that American diplomatic facilities remained vulnerable even after substantial improvements in security. It contributed to a major reassessment of how the United States protected its embassies, diplomats and other personnel overseas. During the 1980s, the State Department dramatically increased its spending on diplomatic security, eventually beginning a large program to construct or strengthen dozens of diplomatic facilities around the world. The Beirut attacks became important examples of the changing nature of international terrorism in the 1980s, particularly the growing use of suicide vehicle bombs against heavily guarded political and military targets.