Updated on: August 28, 2026 / 9:11 PM EDT
/ CBS News
American diplomats and at least some of their family members are beginning to return to U.S. embassies in the Middle East after many were ordered to leave their posts during the early days of the war with Iran.
Although most embassies are not returning to full strength immediately, starting this week the State Department has begun to lift certain staffing and other restrictions on personnel.
The changes are not necessarily reflective of a shift in the Trump administration's policy toward Iran, which is now focused on economic rather than kinetic military warfare. Instead, the changes are mainly due to the legalities of human resources policy, which limits the time diplomats may be away from post while still being paid and collecting benefits for themselves and their families.
On Friday, the day the Iran war hit its six-month mark, embassies in Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain announced they would allow diplomats' family members to return, although in Bahrain and Kuwait it applies only to those older than 18.
Earlier in the week, all family members of U.S. government employees in Israel, as well as those who are over 21 of those who work in Lebanon, were given the go-ahead to return.
Naim Qassem, the head of the militant group Hezbollah, on Friday again rejected a deal struck between Israel and Lebanon, and said his Iran-backed group refused to "surrender," nearly six months after war erupted with Israel.
"We are against the framework agreement and call for its downfall," Qassem said in a televised address broadcast on the group's Al-Manar television channel.
Israel and Lebanon began U.S.-sponsored direct talks after Hezbollah drew Lebanon into the Middle East war on March 2 by attacking Israel, which responded with massive strikes and a ground invasion that Lebanese authorities say have killed more than 4,300 people.
At talks in late June, Lebanon and Israel signed a framework deal that calls for the disarmament of Hezbollah, a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from south Lebanon and the deployment of the Lebanese army to the region, starting in "pilot zones."
"The framework agreement is illegitimate, unlawful, humiliating, destructive to Lebanese sovereignty," Qassem said Friday.
"We do not agree to the 'pilot zones' or to what comes from them," he said.
Although violence has dropped since the Israel-Lebanon framework agreement in June, Lebanon still reports regular Israeli strikes, artillery shelling and broad demolition of civilian buildings in southern villages and towns.
Israeli forces are operating inside a self-declared "security zone," which runs about six miles deep inside Lebanese territory along the border.
Qassem said his group supported the implementation of a November 2024 ceasefire that sought to end a previous war with Israel.
