Following the dramatic explosions of communication devices around Lebanon on Tuesday and Wednesday, some of which were used by the military group Hezbollah, at least 32 people—including two children—were murdered and many more injured, many of them critically. According to Lebanon’s health ministry, walkie-talkies that exploded on Wednesday caused at least 450 injuries and 20 fatalities in the most recent series of explosions. The bombs happened close to a sizable gathering of people attending the funerals of four individuals who were killed in Tuesday’s simultaneous pager explosions, which left almost 3,000 people injured and at least 12 dead.
Hezbollah Device Explosions
Ambulances struggled to reach the injured amid hectic scenes recorded by BBC crews in the city, and residents were wary of anyone using a phone. The explosions, which occurred one day after an ostensibly comparable and extremely sophisticated attack that targeted thousands of pagers used by Hezbollah members, increased social unrest in Lebanon. The extremist organization accused Israel, its enemy. Two Hungarian and Taiwanese companies that were allegedly in charge of producing the pagers in media reports have both denied any involvement.
How did the attacks unfold?
At roughly 15:30 local time (13:30 BST) on Tuesday, the first round of explosions started in Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, and a number of other locations across the nation. Before exploding, the pagers appeared to have received messages from Hezbollah’s leadership, according to the New York Times, which cited US authorities.
As per the outlet, it seems that the texts were what activated the gadgets. Following that, a large number of people started showing up at hospitals throughout Lebanon; eyewitnesses reported widespread confusion in the emergency rooms.
A second set of explosions occurred nationwide on Wednesday at approximately 17:00 local time (15:00 BST), with similar scenarios playing out throughout. According to a security source who spoke to the Reuters news agency, the gadgets that were blown up are believed to have been walkie-talkies, which Hezbollah bought five months prior.
A funeral for some of the victims of Tuesday’s attack was taking place in Beirut when at least one explosion occurred nearby, frightening others who were close to the procession. The health ministry in Lebanon reports that at least 450 people have been hurt and that twenty people have died.
About The devices
Information on the walkie-talkies that went off during Wednesday’s blasts is still surfacing. Remaining footage from the incident showed damaged gadgets with the Japanese business Icom on them. According to a company statement, the IC-V82 model is a portable radio that was sold to the Middle East between 2004 and 2014; it hasn’t been shipped since.
According to Icom, that model’s production ceased ten years ago. It also states that the batteries are no longer being manufactured. It said that only the company’s authorized distributors were sold any products intended for international markets.
The devices that detonated in Lebanon seemed to be knockoffs, a sales official at Icom’s US division told the AP news agency earlier. He also mentioned that it was simple to locate fake versions of the product online. One Hezbollah operative told AP that the pagers that went off on Tuesday were a new brand that the group had never used previously. About five months ago, about 5,000 pagers were imported into the nation, a Lebanese security officer told Reuters.
Pager models known as the Rugged Pager AR-924 are identified by labels found on pieces of detonated pagers. However, Gold Apollo, the product’s Taiwanese producer, has denied any connection to the explosions. Local police were investigating Gold Apollo’s offices, looking through records, and questioning employees on Wednesday when the BBC visited the business.
Hsu Ching-Kuang, the company’s creator, stated that his organization has a contract with BAC, a company situated in Hungary, to produce the gadgets under his brand. Without providing any details, he said that receiving money transfers from them had been “very strange.” According to BAC’s business documents, which BBC Verify obtained, the company was first founded in 2022. Cristiana Bársony-Arcidiacono, the company’s CEO, told NBC that she was unaware of the explosions. “The pagers are not made by me. All I am is the middleman.
What prompted the pager attack?
Axios was informed by unidentified US and Israeli sources that the initial intention was to detonate the pagers simultaneously as the first step in a “all-out” onslaught against Hezbollah. However, Israel was set off early because they were worried that Hezbollah had learned about the operation in recent days.
Although Israeli officials have not responded to the accusations, the majority of analysts believe that Israel is most likely responsible for the strike. Although he described the scope of this attack as “unprecedented,” Lancaster University chair in international relations Prof.
Hezbollah Use Pagers
Hezbollah has attempted to avoid Israeli location monitoring by primarily use pagers as a low-tech form of communication. Wireless telecommunications devices known as pagers are used to receive and display voice or alphanumeric messages. Compared to mobile phones, which have long since been abandoned as being too vulnerable—as Israel’s 1996 death of Hamas bomb-maker Yahya Ayyash illustrated when his phone detonated in his hand—they are far more difficult to follow.
Hezbollah fighters were ordered by Hassan Nasrallah to destroy their phones in February, claiming that Israeli intelligence had infiltrated their group. He gave his soldiers orders to destroy, bury, or imprison their phones within an iron cage. According to experts, the command, which was given during a live broadcast, might have notified Israeli intelligence agents that the group was looking for a new, probably less sophisticated, means of communication.
About The Victims of Tuesday’s Attack
Two of those slain in Tuesday’s attack were the sons of two Hezbollah MPs, according to a source close to the organization who spoke to the AFP news agency. They added that a Hezbollah member’s daughter had been murdered. Mojtaba Amani, Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, was one of the injured. Iranian media reported that he had only minor wounds. According to Reuters, which cited a source, Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, was unharmed by the explosives.
According to Firass Abiad, the minister of public health of Lebanon, the bulk of injuries were to the hands and face. He told the BBC’s Newshour show that the victims presenting to emergency facilities ranged in age from the very young to the very old, and some were even dressed in civilian clothes. In addition to Lebanon, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a campaign organization headquartered in the UK, reports that 14 individuals were hurt in comparable explosions in neighboring Syria.
The Hezbollah-Israel Conflict Escalate
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 explosions occurred within hours of Israel’s security cabinet declaring the country’s north’s people’ safe return to be an official war objective.
Whilst visiting an Israeli airbase on Wednesday, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced that the country was “opening a new phase in the war” and that the “centre of gravity is shifting to the north through the diversion of resources and forces”.
Final Words
In the deadliest day in Lebanon since cross-border violence broke out between the militants and Israel almost a year ago, Hezbollah’s hand-held radios exploded across the country’s south on Wednesday. This heightened tensions following similar explosions of the group’s pagers the day before. The Bekaa Valley and the suburbs of Beirut saw 20 fatalities and over 450 injuries on Wednesday, according to the health ministry of Lebanon. The number of individuals killed from Tuesday’s blasts increased to 12, including two children, and the number of injured to nearly 3,000.