Dozens killed in terror attack against Iranian Embassy in Beirut

Two explosions, at least one caused by a suicide bomber, rocked Iran's Embassy in Beirut on Tuesday, killing at least 23 people, including an Iranian cultural attaché, and hurling bodies, cars and debris across the street. The Lebanese-based Abdullah Azzam Brigades, which are linked to the terror network al-Qaeda, claimed responsibility for what it described as a double suicide attack on the Iranian mission in southern Beirut. Lebanon has suffered a series of bomb attacks and clashes linked to the conflict in neighboring Syria.

Security camera footage showed a man in an explosives belt rushing towards the outer wall of the Embassy building before blowing himself up, Lebanese officials said. They said the second explosion was caused by a car bomb parked two buildings away from the compound. In a Twitter post, Sheikh Sirajeddine Zuraiqat, the religious guide of the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, said the group had carried out the attack. "It was a double martyrdom operation by two of the Sunni heroes of Lebanon," he wrote.

Lebanon's Health Minister Ali Hassan Khalil said 23 people had been killed and 146 wounded.

Shiite Iran actively supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against Sunni Muslim rebels, who are backed and armed by Sunni powers Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Syrian rebel groups, some linked to al Qaeda, have threatened to take their battle from Syria to Lebanon in response to the military involvement of Iran and its Lebanese Shi'ite guerrilla ally Hezbollah alongside Assad's forces. The attack followed car bombings in Sunni and Shiite Muslim strongholds in Beirut and the northern city of Tripoli in August, in which a total of at least 66 people were killed.