The car bomb was detonated by a suicide bomber driving a van packed with nearly 2,000 pounds (900 kg) of explosives at approximately 1:00 p.m. (GMT+2) April 18, 1983.

The van, originally sold in Texas, bought used and shipped to the Gulf,[3] gained access to the embassy compound and parked under the portico at the very front of the building, where it exploded.

[4] The blast collapsed the entire central facade of the horseshoe-shaped building, leaving the wreckage of balconies and offices in heaped tiers of rubble, and spewing masonry, metal and glass fragments in a wide swath.

[6] Others killed included William R. McIntyre, deputy director of the United States Agency for International Development, two of his aides, and four US military personnel.

Lebanese victims included clerical workers at the embassy, visa applicants waiting in line and nearby motorists and pedestrians.

"[7] Two envoys, Philip C. Habib and Morris Draper, continued their peace mission in Beirut to discuss Lebanese troop withdrawals with a renewed sense of urgency.

The next day, Ambassador Robert Dillon, who had narrowly escaped injury in the bombing, said: "Paramount among the essential business is our work for the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Lebanon."

"[6] Defense Minister Moshe Arens, was quoted by Israeli radio that he told the cabinet the attack "justified Israel's demands for security arrangements in Lebanon."

"[6] The House Foreign Affairs Committee April 19 voted to approve $251 million in additional economic and military aid for Lebanon, as requested by the administration.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee followed suit April 20, approving the aid request but attaching an amendment that required the president to obtain congressional authorization for "any substantial expansion in the number or role of US armed forces in Lebanon or for the creation of a new, expanded or extended multinational peacekeeping force in Lebanon."

It prevented a move by the committee's ranking Democrat, Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island, to extend the 1973 War Powers Resolution to Lebanon.

After the embassy bombing, April 19, Republican Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona said, "I think it's high time we bring the boys home."

Judge Royce Lamberth of the US District Court in Washington, D.C., on May 30, 2003, stated that the bombing was carried out by the militant group Hezbollah with the approval and financing of senior Iranian officials, paving the way for the victims to seek damages.