. >> reporter: that, even though libya is an unstable country ayman mohyeldin has more. >> reporter: libyan officials say there was plenty of facts to pick up on, the borders were wide open, and should have alerted them to beef up security at the compound. >> reporter: others have requested a thorough investigation. >> it is not explainable and inexcusable that our personnel were not better protected. >> reporter: the state department says it has enhanced security where appropriate around the world, and says it will not comment further on details pending an fbi investigation. lisa meyers, nbc news, washington. >>> and tonight, a recording of mitt romney at a private fundraiser has gone public in remarks he thought would stay among those in the room. the gop presidential candidate is heard giving a snap shot of the electorate that will raise eyebrows when heard. the recording was released to the liberal magazine "mother jones." before we talk about it we want to play a portion of it. >> for the past three years, how are you going to do it, in two months before the elections? >> well,

nbc's ayman mohyeldin is in benghazi tonight where he has an exclusive with the president of libya tonight about what happened. good evening. >> reporter: the details of the attack that killed the american ambassador and three others may not be clear. according to libya's president there is no doubt in his mind who is responsible for the attack. the charred remains of the u.s. consulate in benghazi. libya's president said today the attack was not the aftermath of a spontaneous outburst of street protests over an anti-islam movie. >> i have no doubts about this. it is a preplanned attack. very sinister. with criminal intentions. >> reporter: for the first time president mohamed magariaf said it wasn't just libyans involved in the attack. without giving details he said foreigners participated in planning and orchestrating the assault. >> we have assumptions and we have some information. and all the information that we have now leads to the same direction. >> reporter: one possible reason the u.s. was targeted -- revenge. earlier this year a u.s. drone strike killed one of al qaeda's most sen

. >> nbc's ayman mohyeldin is live in libya. let's talk about u.s. officials on the ground there.ople in custody in this incident? >> reporter: right now we know that libyan officials have rounded up anywhere between 30 to 40 -- as to who were the pre perpetrators behind this attack, perhaps some under the banner of foreign fighters that may have come in here. the libyan president is keen on saying this was a preplanned attack and had the hallmark of foreign fighters coming into exploit that security vacuum in the country. right now we understand that the libyan officials have been able to pinpoint some individuals who were there that night of the attack, some of the protesters. they have been able to seize some cell phone footage of those demonstrations and identify people there and speak to witnesses. they've also spoken to some of the security guards that were protecting the embassy who were wounded in the attack and now being treated here in libyan hom hospitals. they're trying to piece together what actually happened that night. they've also sealed the u.s. compound to try an

ayman mohyeldin is live in benghazi this morning. the investigation, i know all of your sources are indicating premeditation. the white house and the state department and even the intelligence sources on our end here in washington really pushing back hard saying they don't have evidence to back up the libyan claims. what do you hear? >> well, at this particular time it is difficult to marry the two together but what seems to possibly have happened is a hybrid of the two situations. as you mentioned, the libyan officials here on the ground are saying categorically that this was a preplanned attack, meaning were there were elements, foreign elements that came in ex-employed the security vacuum, began putting in motion a scenario where they wanted to attack either the u.s. consulate or other diplomatic facilities or perhaps even target ambassador stevens himself. when that was going to happen and under what circumstances remained largely mysterious to the officials here. having said that then, with the spontaneous outbreak of anger and

foreign correspondent ayman mohyeldin joins me from beirut. tell us what's happening in there?, a large part of the government in lebanon, had called for large demonstrations. what's happening today? >> in fact, they did. it was the largest protest they've called to date and it happened in a place here known as ballbeck. thousands of people showed up, relatively peaceful. here in the heart of beirut, there was a counter rally, a rally organized rather by sunni muslims and that, too, was relatively peaceful. about 2,000 people showed up. what you're seeing across the arab world, particularly in countries like egypt and here in lebanon, as well as in libya, are protests denouncing that u.s.-made film but at the same time really shying away from violence. you've seen in the past 72 hours or so, a very strong push by religious leaders, political figures, to denounce the type of violence that we saw against the u.s. embassy and other u.s. facilities around the arab world. you get a sense that the situation at least now is being contained. people are still upset about the caricatures

. >> nbc's ayman mohyeldin is live in libya. two wildly differing accounts as to what these attacks and the source of, you know, who executed them. i guess, in terms of the intel that you have over there, do we have any further information regarding whether they were premeditated or not? just how much this individual was the had thing that sort of set off the blaze of muslim protests across the muslim world? >> well, at this particular stage it seems it's a little bit of a hybrid between the two different accounts that we heard there between the u.s. ambassador as well as the libyan president, and they're not necessarily contradictory to one another. the libyan president believes an so do other libyan officials there was a plan that was set in motion several months ago the over the course of the last several months in the security vacuum that existed here in libya, foreign elements, perhaps those linked or inspired by al qaeda, entered libya with the plans of carrying out some type of attack. we've seen attacks on diplomatic mis