Fact Checking the Arab Media

Fact Check Assessment: False

The news surrounding the evacuation of the entire diplomatic staff and the employees of the embassy of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is False. The doors of the embassy, whose known address is on Bliss street near the American University in Beirut, are still open, and the embassy is still providing its consular services and receiving queries in a normal way throughout November, with the testimony of the Saudi diplomat we spoke to, and in the continued presence of chargé d’affaires and director of the consular department Rajeh al-Otaibi. Likewise, the fact that the embassy kept its accounts on social media working normally, and that Ambassador Waleed Bukhari is directly following up on the Lebanese file on a daily basis, indicate that the diplomatic relations between the two countries are normal, with the exception of the summoning of the ambassadors. Furthermore, both LBC and MTV, who originally ran the false news which then spread across Lebanese platforms, removed the clips in the days following its original posting, indicating that neither broadcast outlet had much confidence anymore in their original reporting.

Indeed, Saudi Arabia used Kordahi’s critical statements - actually delivered one month before his appointment as minister in Premier Najib Mikati’s government last September - as a pretext to summon its ambassador in Beirut, Waleed Bukhari, back to Saudi Arabia, deport Lebanese Ambassador to Riyadh Fawzi Kabbara, and encourage some Gulf and Arab states to diplomatically shun Lebanon. As a result, the Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and Yemen all pulled out their ambassadors from Lebanon, expelled the Lebanese ambassadors and banned Lebanese exports. Amid this state of diplomatic reprisal, which appeared to use Kordahi’s statement as a pretext to shed light on political and regional demands that run much deeper for Saudi Arabia, as was intimated by Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan on Hadley Gamble’s show on CNBC, two Lebanese broadcast news sites - LBC and MTV - then reported on November 6, 2021 (the clips were subsequently removed from both sites) that “diplomatic and administrative staff from the Saudi embassy left Beirut International Airport.”

In diplomatic language, this meant that the Saudi embassy on Bliss Street was completely vacated in preparation for the total severance of the relations between the two countries. The report was also circulated by a number of websites, newspapers, and television channels, including Al-Araby al-Jadeed channel, whose correspondent in Beirut Joyce al-Hajj announced the news while saying that no confirmation was issued by the Lebanese presidency in this regard, saying that the source she relied on were the “Saudi embassy employees in Beirut,” assuring that the Saudi embassy had pulled out all its employees, administrators, and diplomats (Watch Al-Araby al-Jadeed report).

Other websites that carried the report were the Kataeb website, En-Nashra website which quoted LBC, and the Janoubia website.

In fact, between November 6-7, 2021, the report occupied the main headlines of most of the local websites and newscasts, while no denial was issued by any official Saudi source.

When we reached out to one Lebanese diplomat currently working at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants in Beirut - an official who enjoys close ties with the Saudi diplomatic staff - the official said, on condition of anonymity, that the work at the Saudi embassy on Bliss street was continuing normally. Furthermore, when Riyadh had earlier pulled out its ambassador, Waleed Bukhari, it immediately appointed a new chargé d’affaires and director of the consular department, Mr. Rajeh al-Otaibi, who is currently managing the Saudi embassy. Likewise, the official explained, Riyadh appointed new military, cultural, and commercial attachés with Lebanon during the ambassador’s absence, though the Lebanese diplomat did not reveal their names: