“Justice will be done.” The promise came from President Obama on Wednesday, condemning the attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi, Libya, on the 11th anniversary of 9/11 that killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens (pictured) and three other U.S. State Department officials. The Americans were targeted in a rocket attack amid riots over a U.S. film depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a fraud. As details continue to trickle in—sources now say the attack was pre-planned—and violent protests continue in Libya, Tunisia, and Egypt, The Daily Beast revisits the event and chronicles the aftermath.
The U.S. consulate where the attack took place is in Benghazi, the second-largest city in Libya. The compound, based on information provided by The Washington Post and The New York Times, is said to be in a prosperous residential district of the city, is walled off, and contains several buildings, a pool, and a security watchtower. It’s accessible through two gates.
Map by Newsweek/Daily Beast, Image from GeoEye via Google Earth
Several American diplomatic missions faced protests after the online release of Innocence of Muslims, a film that depicted the Prophet Muhammad as, among other things, a child molester, a fraud, a womanizer, and a killer. In Benghazi, protesters fired with semi-automatic weapons, threw handmade bombs onto the compound, shot rocket-propelled grenades, and set fire to the U.S. consulate. On Wednesday morning, a small American flag lay on a pile of rubble.
Tariq AL-hun / UPI-Landov
A photo taken the day after the attack reveals the extent of the violence and firepower the consulate and the people inside faced when it was stormed by protesters the night before. CNN reports that Stevens and members of his team were separated from other members of his staff while attempting to escape to the roof of the building, trapped in a safe room as the consulate burned around them. Libyan security units and U.S. guards initially attempted to ward off the gunmen, but, after five hours of clashing, withdrew and the protesters stormed the building.
ESAM OMRAN AL-FETORI / Reuters-Landov
The American flag flies at half-mast Wednesday at the State Department building in Washington, D.C. Remembering Ambassador Stevens, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said: “He arrived on a cargo ship in the port of Benghazi and began building our relationships with Libya’s revolutionaries. He risked his life trying to build a better Libya.”
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With Secretary of State Clinton by his side, President Obama addressed the Libya attacks in a speech Wednesday at the White House Rose Garden. “The United States condemns in the strongest terms this outrageous and shocking attack,” the president said. He ensured that the events “will not break the bonds” between the U.S. and Libya, but also promised, “We will not waver in our commitment to see justice is done for this terrible act,” adding, “And make no mistake, justice will be done.”
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Libyan civilians pull an unconscious man from the burning U.S. consulate in Benghazi. Later that night, a U.S. eyewitness will identify the man, who suffered severe smoke inhalation, as Ambassador Christopher Stevens. Two months before his death, Stevens wrote a letter to his friends assuring them the atmosphere in Libya had changed for the better: “People smile more and are much more open with foreigners.” Libyan Prime Minister Aburrahim el-Keib has apologized for the attack, calling it a “cowardly, criminal act.”
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The violence started sometime between 10:30 and 11 p.m., a source tells The Washington Post, when roughly 50 armed men reached the compound. Security guarding the compound quickly began trading fire with the group. According to Benghazi residents, the consulate never had a formidable security presence, and the forces were outgunned by the attackers, who by that point had joined the hundreds who were demonstrating against the anti-Islam film.
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Sources now say the attack was planned, and the attackers were using the protest outside the consulate as a diversion. “This was a well-armed, well-coordinated event,” said Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. “It had both indirect and direct fire, and it had military maneuvers that were all part of this very organized attack.” The chief suspect, sources tracking militant Islamist groups in eastern Libya tell CNN, is a pro-al Qaeda group. The Washington Post reports that the attack was ordered to avenge the death of a senior Libyan member of the terrorist group.
Esam Al-Fetori / Reuters-Landov
An armed man waves his rifle in the air at the site of the U.S. consulate in Benghazi as buildings and cars engulfed in flames blaze around him. On Wednesday, the Defense Department dispatched an elite group of Marines specializing in antiterrorism security to guard the area. Libyan Deputy Interior Minister Wanis al-Sharif said Wednesday that he never expected the crowds to burn and loot the consulate, but he wished the U.S. had extracted its employees earlier in the day, as the protests escalated. “The most we expected was taking down the American flag and burning it,” he said. “We didn’t expect what happened to take place.”
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Demonstrators gathered Tuesday in Tunisia to protest Innocence of Muslims. For the second time in as many days, a crowd of more than 100 people gathered outside the U.S. Embassy in Tunis waving black jihadist flags and carrying signs with slogans condemning the anti-Muslim film.
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Protesters also gathered in Egypt on Wednesday to condemn the film. In an interview with the Associated Press, the filmmaker defended his work, calling Islam a “cancer” and defending his film as political statement against religion. He is reportedly in hiding, though earlier reports that he was Israeli or Jewish seem to be false, as the name he was originally identified with may be a pseudonym.
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In Cairo on Tuesday, more than 2,000 protesters gathered at U.S. Embassy to demonstrate against the film. They scaled the walls, tore down the American flag, and burned it. According to The Daily Beast’s Jamie Dettmer, while the focus of the rallying was the movie disparaging the Prophet Muhammad, the protesters also seized on the significance of the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. They “also railed also against the U.S. generally, decrying the post-9/11 U.S.-led invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and American support for Israel.” The Libyan government also acknowledged Wednesday the connections between the Benghazi violence and the Egyptian protests: “There is a connection between this attack and the protests that have been happening in Cairo.”
Ahmed Jomaa / UPI-Landov
