Marilyn Gleason: Recently, as everybody knows, the US attacked Iran, causing some retaliation and, um, really increasing the general instability in the Middle East. On March 3rd, drones hit the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia. Two drones hit the roof and the perimeter of the chancery, which was reported in the Wall Street Journal.
According to the Guardian, loud explosions were heard and clouds of smoke seen in the city's Diplomatic Quarter, home to foreign embassies in the capital and residences of foreign diplomats. I'm talking today to our own Lily Jones at KDNK. Hi Lily.
Lily Jones: Hi Marilyn.
MG: Your parents are there in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
LJ: Yes, they are. And my little brother,
MG: So, things that go bump in the night. You heard a story from your father?
LJ: Yes. So they obviously bombed in the middle of the night when nobody was there, thankfully. And the way my dad tells it is that, I mean, first of all, it woke him up, but the first explosion, it's like, boom, just like the onomatopoeia, just like how it's spelled. And then following that, some anti-aircraft fire, and then another big boom, and I think that it was over.
MG: So he was just woken up in the middle of the night by this attack on the embassy.
LJ: That's right. Their house is about 800 feet away. Tell me about your parents.
What are they doing there? So my mom is a federal employee working in a major embassy sector. My dad also works within the embassy compound, but he is not a federal employee. My brother is about to be 19 later in April, but he moved over there when he was still in high school, so he had to finish high school in Saudi Arabia.
MG: So can you describe where your parents are and, and what's the kind of set up there, and the situation that they're in right now?
LJ: So, Riyadh is the capital of Saudi Arabia, which is the largest country on the Arabian Peninsula. And Riyadh is almost exactly in the middle. There are nearly 8 million people there and within that city is the Diplomatic Quarter, or the DQ, and that is where all of the embassies are. And there's lots of housing for people who work in those embassies. It's like a tiny city within the city.
MG: Is it sort of like a gated community in a way?
LJ: Sort of, yes, there is security when you come back in, you know, there's guys with guns there, but they're also going to build a shopping mall, or at least that's the last thing I heard, within the DQ for people to come to. So I'm not really sure how they're going to balance security with, you know, crowds of moms and kids coming in to visit the mall.
MG: So since this, um, attack on the embassy, your family has actually been sheltering in place? Yes, they are under shelter in place indefinitely, we don't know, and they'll be able to return back to work.
LJ: Obviously, the embassy suffered extensive fire damage, so they probably won't be returning to that building specifically anytime soon.
MG: So I just, I hope your family is doing well and that they're safe and that you are feeling okay about that. It has struck me so far in our conversations about this that everybody seems pretty casual, um, and blasé considering there's a war going on, and they're so close to the US Embassy.
LJ: Well, you'd think that everybody would be panicking, but I mean, there's a couple points here that make me feel a little bit better. I mean, number one is that they hit the embassy in the middle of the night and rather than killing, you know, dozens, maybe hundreds of U.S. federal employees, I think they decided to just make a point and say, 'Hey look, I can bomb your embassy. What are you gonna do about it? Look how big and powerful I am.'
The other thing is that they are under an Authorized Departure rather than a Mandatory Departure [order]. And that's not the exact terminology, but it's pretty close.
So if you want to leave, you can, and Washington will pay for you to get out, but they're not being forced to evacuate.
MG: What's it like there in the diplomatic quarter right now? From what you can tell and what you've heard?
LJ: You know, as confident and maybe as blasé as we seem about this, it's obviously still a very scary situation. My mom was saying that the day following. The drone strike there was rain and thunder, which is a very rare occurrence. And when you hear that thunder the day after the bombing, I mean, what are you going to think that that is? She's also been sleeping downstairs on the couch and not upstairs on the second floor. So I think there's still is a little bit of fear going on and, um. Hopefully I, I think they'll just continue to exercise caution, and if it really does get down to that time where they need to go, I think I can trust my family members to make smart decisions.
MG: Well, Lily, we'll be thinking of you and, um, keeping your family in our thoughts as well, so, all right.
LJ: Well, thank you for having me.
MG: Yeah, thanks.
This story was recorded on Friday. The State Department has since ordered U.S. nationals home, including Lily's family.
