Americans evacuated from Lebanon (21, remainder "sit tight")

[uppityperson]

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-07-16T204937Z_01_N16406924_RTRUKOC_0_US-MIDEAST-USA-CITIZENS.xml

A first batch of 21 Americans was evacuated to Cyprus from Lebanon on Sunday as a special U.S. military team arrived to plan for what could be a much bigger evacuation sparked by the conflict with Israel.

The arrival of the U.S. Central Command's survey and assessment team of up to 20 people was "an important first step in facilitating the safe departure of Americans who want to leave Lebanon," the embassy said on its Web site.

Estimates of the number of U.S. citizens in Lebanon range up to 25,000. Israeli air raids, retaliating for Hizbollah rocket attacks, struck Beirut on a fifth day of a bombardment that has killed at least 112 people.

The State Department said it was working with the Defense Department on a plan to help Americans leave who wish to do so, most likely via commercial and charter flights from Cyprus. For now, the State Department urged U.S. citizens to sit tight as it seeks a safe way to get them out. Trying to get to Syria by road was "rather perilous," said Maura Harty, head of the State Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs....(more)

[NYC]

1. They have evacuated 21 people out of 25,000.

That must be what I heard about on the radio this morning.

[Posteritatis]

11. Let's be fair; that's just a start

Largescale evacuations aren't the simplest of things, and you gotta get to the people to get them out. They also have to want to leave in situations like this. Pulling 25,000 people out in that kind of situation will take days or weeks, not hours - and that's without France, Britain and Canada evacuating their nationals.

[NYC]

12. But France and Italy have already begun.

That's the difference.

[Posteritatis]

15. They don't have nearly as much geography to deal with (nt)

[uppityperson]

17. It is a start but what do you mean, not nearly as much geography?nt

[NYC]

18. We have military bases all over the world.

We don't have to send a rescue team from the continental U.S.

[leftchick]

16. okay I will be fair

"Katrina"! nuff said.

[NYC]

20. Bicycle instead of birthday cake this time.

I don't think having his picture taken riding a bicycle portrays concern.

I didn't think much of the birthday cake while New Orleans drowned, either.

[saigon68]

36. IT WILL COME TO THIS

[Up2Late]

26. It would take less time if most of the runways didn't have bomb craters...

...in the middle of them. And maybe a few highways with un-bombed bridges, that might help too.

If they really wanted to get most of the Americans out of Lebanon, they would have started this on Friday, it too late now. Unless they send in the Marines with a few of their LCAC Hovercraft, only the most important (wealthy) people will get out, via helicopter, now



More info on the LCAC at link below
<http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ship/lcac.htm>

[DoYouEverWonder]

41. I wonder who the lucky 21 are?

While everyone else is supposed to sit tight.

[mediaman007]

33. On the other hand, maybe Bush* and the Neocons can show us

how New Orleans should have done it. They were pretty quick with criticism to the locals when everyone didn't get out of N.O.

Now's their chance to show how they can apply their skill and power.

[Henny Penny]

40. The Israelis blowing up the bridges etc can't be helping!

Saw some Western buses with flags on the roofs being evacuated on the telly... I'm not sure that I'd want to be in a bus with a western flag on the roof, even if it wasn't a US one.

But Israel blowing up the bridges and the airport is surely going to make it very difficult for people to make their own way out.

I am a bit bit worried that that some of those 25,000 might become "sitting ducks".

[alcibiades_mystery]

2. "Israeli air raids, retaliating for Hizbollah rocket attacks,..."

"retaliating for Israeli air raids, retaliating for Hizbollah rocket attacks, retaliating for Israeli air raids, retailiating for the kidnapping of two IDF soldiers, retaliating for the Israeli occupation of parts of Lebanon, retaliating for suicide bombings, retaliating for..."

Yeah, the journalist is right. It wouldn't have made as elegant a clause...:rofl:

[MissWaverly]

3. flashbacks to Katrina, sit tight, you'll be fine

[babylonsister]

4. The 21 "important people" are now safe, so let the rest

deal with it? I wonder who the '21' are?

[UpInArms]

5. really - that was my thought, also - just who are those "21"

very very very important people?

[ShortnFiery]

8. The answer is YES ===> embassy staff

Everyone else is on their own. I doubt that any further efforts will be made. After all, most people probably have Arab backgrounds ... they are "the enemy" because Arabs, in general, do not share our European cultural background. <tongue-in-cheek = :sarcasm: sort of> :(

[CJCRANE]

32. relatives of bin Laden...

kidding

;)

[uppityperson]

6. more from article: (dialysis patients, Osama?)

Joined by a second CH-53 helicopter, the evacuation flights carried nonessential embassy staff, some students and people with serious medical needs such as kidney dialysis patients, U.S. officials said.

[babylonsister]

7. Can you imagine?

Osama? :wow:


Any further descriptions of the evacuees, like a very tall Muslim man, perchance?
:rofl:

[UpInArms]

9. I suppose they will have to find another place to stash him

so that he can be ready - in flowing gowns - to deliver his speech prior to the November elections (again) - watch for the announcement on Friday (just before the Tuesday elections) by 12:00 and the show to begin by 3:00 p.m. as they must get it on the air before everyone quits paying attention before the weekend.

:eyes:

[ShortnFiery]

10. No Joke ...

When they showed that lame video of Bin Laden right before the 2004 Presidential Election, I had flashbacks to when I was 10 years old at Disneyland ... you know, in the theater where a *mechanical Abe Lincoln* addressed us. Hey! It was grand in 1969, but made me burst out laughing at the piss poor video of Bin Laden in 2004. :(

[Up2Late]

42. Oh, you're right! Maybe they'll just have to destroy the Osama-tron?

...or sneak it out of Lebanon on a stretcher, covered with a sheet.

[texanwitch]

13. The White House needs to have Americans killed so then we can

go to war with Iran.

They need Americans angry at pictures of dead Americans.

You can smell the blood in the air.

No one is buying the Irans are evil crap so something has to be invented to sell the war.

[babylonsister]

14. How the hell can we support yet another war?

I just don't get it. We're just about out of money, our troops are stretched way too thin as it is, how will dead Americans change the facts? I'm sick of dead Americans in Iraq and want out, not to get something else started.

[uppityperson]

19. Pull the troops not in Iraq for a "quick short term" war

Simple, isn't it? Simple in theory, impossible in reality, which is the problem dealing with this administration.

[texanwitch]

21. We can't support another war, but that isn't stopping the White House

gang. Just print some more money, borrow more money from China.

As for the troops there are still a large number of reserve and guard units that can be called in, and the IRR.

Troops can be pulled out of Europe and Asia.

We have enough troops to start something but not enough to finish, so a draft will be started.

I am so glad I never had children.

[uppityperson]

22. Let the Green Zone implode, dead journalists, at the same time.

Those together will help fuel the next part of the war.

[rainbow4321]

30. Chimp's peope need Hezbollah to be the new Al Queda...

use them as the new terror threat, as an excuse to get into Iran. I don't watch the MSM anymore but I imagine they already got a Rove office memo about now focusing on Hezbollah.

And as an added bonus, it gets everyone's attention away from North Korea getting up in chimp's face with their missle launches.
Missles? What NK Missiles?

[ellenfl]

23. could we have 24,979 cia/military

personnel already in lebanon?

ellen fl

[uppityperson]

24. Spies? In Lebanon???????

"diplomats" you must mean. :rofl:

[robinlynne]

25. ok. If the french are using ferries, why doesn't the US use ferries?

[texanwitch]

28. The White House gang wants dead Americans so they can have

their war with Iran. They really don't want to start a draft, so they really need to increase enlistment.

Pictures of dead Americans might do it.

Just think 24 hours a day of pictures of dead Americans running on CNN and Fox, that might do it.

[Penndems]

27. Full-scale evacuations will not start until this Wednesday

Heard it on CNN about an hour ago. The plan is not finalized yet.

[uppityperson]

29. seriously?

why am I laughing at this? "no one could have imagined..."

[Penndems]

31. Yep - they had a Consular Officer on from the U.S. Consulate in Beirut

I believe her name was Anne Pettys.

She said that the plan hadn't been finalized yet, all options for evacuation were being explored, but the operation wouldn't start until at least Wednesday.

[w4rma]

34. Hahaha, 25 thousand people to evacuate and they couldn't even handle

evacuations in **our own country** before/after a hurricane. Of course they won't start until Wednesday. The Repug leadership is incompetant in everything except making themselves wealthy through theft and con-artistry.

**And** the Repug leadership has been blocking all calls for a ceasefire so they are **actively** putting American civilians in danger.

[Penndems]

35. Here's a link to the State Department's Lebanon Situation Update

website. Well worth bookmarking, and visiting frequently. I also posted this in the Israel/Palestine Forum.

If anyone has a friend or loved one in Lebanon, please pass it on:

http://www.travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/tw/lebanon_update.html

[DeepModem Mom]

37. US Evacuates Medical Cases (and non-essential Embassy staff) From Lebanon

NYT/Reuters: US Evacuates Medical Cases From Lebanon
By REUTERS
Published: July 16, 2006

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The first U.S. Embassy employees and Americans with medical needs were evacuated from Lebanon on Sunday by a Marine Corps helicopter bound for Cyprus as shelling between Hizbollah and Israel intensified.

The flight carried about 20 people, including several with conditions requiring such things as kidney dialysis, and nonessential U.S. personnel, said Air Force Lt. Sharbe Clark, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Central Command.

A U.S. security team had flown in earlier in the day on the same CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter to plan for a larger evacuation of the estimated 25,000 Americans in Lebanon....

***

White House officials said earlier the embassy was not being evacuated.

"The embassy is open and will remain open in support of American citizens in Lebanon,'' said Frederick Jones, spokesman for the White House National Security Council....

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/washington/politics-mideast-usa-citizens.html

[saigon68]

38. REDUX

[Rumach]

39. "Non-essential Personnel?"

If they were'nt essential, what the eff were they doing there
in the first place???