Summary:
- According to numerous accounts, Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency planted explosives in thousands of Hezbollah pagers before they exploded around Lebanon.
- The country’s health ministry believes that at least 12 people, including two children, were killed and 2,750 are still hospitalized following Tuesday’s pager explosions.
- According to Reuters, a top Lebanese security source, the pagers were introduced into the nation several months prior. Separately, US and Israeli officials claim that Israel set off the pagers earlier than intended because of concern that Hezbollah would have learned about the operation.
- After outlawing cell phones earlier this year on the grounds that they were too easy to track, Hezbollah turned to pagers.
- Although the pagers appeared to have a Taiwanese brand, Taiwanese company Gold Apollo disputes any involvement, claiming that a Hungarian company created the pagers.
Pagers used by Hezbollah, an armed group, to communicate dramatically burst almost
simultaneously across the country on Tuesday, inflicting thousands of injuries. There were about
2,800 injuries, many of them serious, and at least nine fatalities.
Although Israel is Hezbollah’s enemy, it is unknown how the attack, which appears to have been
very sophisticated, happened. So far, no official comments have been made by Israeli officials.
Where and when did it happen?
The explosion started in Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, on Tuesday at approximately 15:45 (local
time) (13:45 BST). The explosions also happened in numbers in various other parts of the nation.
Witnesses said they saw little explosions that sounded like fireworks and gunshots, followed by
smoke emerging from people’s pockets. CCTV footage appeared to show an explosion when a
man was standing at a checkout counter in one shot.
Following the initial explosions, explosions persisted for around an hour in various locations,
according to the Reuters news agency. Numerous patients started showing up in hospitals all
around Lebanon shortly after, and witnesses described scenes of widespread confusion.
- What is a pager?
- A pager is a wireless communication device that may transmit and receive voice or text messages.
How did the pagers explode?
The magnitude of Tuesday’s attack has shocked analysts, who point out that Hezbollah takes
pride in its security protocols. Some even speculated that the devices may have exploded due to
overheating pager batteries caused by a cyberattack.
An action of that kind would be unheard of. However, a lot of specialists disagree, pointing out
that the explosion film is incompatible with the batteries overheating. Alternatively, other
researchers argue that there was a greater chance of a supply chain attack, where the pagers
were altered either during manufacturing or during the transit.
The cyber security community is becoming increasingly concerned about supply chain assaults as
a result of several high-profile events in which hackers gained access to items during
development. However, software is typically the only target of these attacks.
Attacks on the hardware supply chain are much less common since they require physical access
to the device. Had this been a supply chain attack, there would have been a massive operation to
surreptitiously alter the pagers in some way. The pagers were loaded with a small quantity of
explosives months before the devices were brought into Lebanon, according to security officials
there.
Hezbollah has attempted to avoid Israeli location monitoring by primarily using pagers as a low-
tech form of communication. As evidenced by Israel’s 1996 death of Hamas bomb builder Yahya
Ayyash, whose phone exploded in his grasp.
Mobile phones have long since been abandoned as being just too suspectible. However, one
Hezbollah operative claimed to the news agency that the group had never used the pageants
before and that they were a new brand.
About 5 months ago, about 5000 pagers were brought into the country, a Lebanese security
officer told the Reuters news agency. Hezbollah was extremely embarrassed by the security
breach, according to Emily Harding, a former CIA analyst.
She continued, “Not only would such a breach be dangerous for their lives, but it will also cause
them to doubt their entire security apparatus. I would expect to see them conduct an intensive
internal investigation that will distract them from a potential fight with Israel.
Pager models known as the Rugged Pager AR-924 are identified by labels found on pieces of
detonated pagers. However, Gold Apollo, a Taiwanese manufacturer, has denied any connection
to the explosions. Hsu Ching-Kuang, the company’s creator, stated that his organization has a
contract with BAC, a company with headquarters in Europe, to produce the gadgets under his
brand. Local police were swarming Gold Apollo’s offices on Wednesday, looking through
documents and interviewing employees, when the source visited the company.
Hezbollah is associated with Iran, the region’s worst adversary of Israel. As part of Tehran’s Axis
of Resistance, the organization and Israel have been fighting a low-level war for months, with
rocket and missile exchanges taking place routinely across Israel’s northern border. On both
sides, entire towns have been uprooted. The safe return of citizens to Israel’s northern regions
was declared an official war goal by the security cabinet only hours prior to the explosions.
Netanyahu, the prime minister, promised to “do what is necessary to ensure its security” to a
visiting US official.
Israel’s domestic security service announced earlier on Monday that it had foiled a Hezbollah
effort to kill a former official. Despite the continuous skirmishes, analysts note that up until now,
both sides have tried to keep hostilities under control without going all out for war. Hezbollah
has already threatened to retaliate for Tuesday’s explosives, raising concerns that the situation
may get out of hand.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cz04m913m49o
