The State Department has begun evacuating nonessential diplomats and their families from the U.S. embassy in Israel as hostilities between Israel and Iran intensify and President Donald Trump warns of the possibility of getting directly involved in the conflict.
A government plane evacuated a number of diplomats and family members who had asked to leave the country Wednesday, said two U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive diplomatic movements. There was no indication of how many diplomats and family members departed on the flight or how many may have left by land routes to Jordan or Egypt.
The flight came shortly before U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee announced on X that the embassy was making plans for evacuations by plane and ship for private American citizens.
Hours after Huckabee's tweet, however, the State Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs tweeted that "we have no announcement about assisting private U.S. citizens to depart at this time" from Israel or the Palestinian territories.
The State Department didn't explain the discrepancy but said in response to questions that it is considering all options and "will alert the U.S. citizen community if there is additional information to share regarding departure options." It added that it is providing information about routes out of Israel to Americans who want to leave "by their own means" and urged them to go as soon as it's safe to do so.