‘A very sophisticated attack’
We have some more comments from military analyst Elijah Magnier on the near simultaneous pager explosions in Lebanon.
- This is a very sophisticated attack, and normally at this scale, it requires the collaboration of more than one entity.
- If Israeli intelligence managed to compromise the pagers that have been supplied to Hezbollah, this [does not exclude] that they have managed to access the supply by Iran because Iran supplies Hezbollah with most of its equipment.
- An operation of this scale needs the presence of high explosives, even in small quantities, and an awfully long time to sit at every single pager and manually insert 1 to 3 grammes [0.4 to 0.11oz] of highly explosive material and yet conserve the functionality of the pager, the screen and all the electronics without all of this being affected.
- That requires the work of more than one intelligence service and a break in the channel of supply.
- That can also indicate that there is an explosive because batteries don’t explode on their own in Beirut, in th Bekaa Valley, in the south of Lebanon and in Syria and everywhere there is a pager at the same instant.
- This is not something related to the malfunction of the pager, but it is something that is implemented in it and exploded by a frequency, most likely a radio frequency.
- In this case, we understand Israeli intelligence has placed this explosive with the support of a third country before they reached Hezbollah
- This means that they have not only taken their time but they also sat on this supply for a long time before it reached its final destination and most probably the Iranians will now be examining all their products and equipment to make sure that nobody has tampered in what they have acquired.
Hezbollah says three people, including a girl, killed in pager explosions
We now have Hezbollah’s first statement about the explosions of communication devices in Lebanon.
“At approximately 3:30pm [12:30 GMT] on Tuesday 09-17-2024, a number of message-receiving devices known as ‘pagers’ exploded, which were owned by a number of workers in various Hezbollah units and institutions,” the group said.
“These explosions, the causes of which are still unknown, led to the martyrdom of a girl and two brothers and the injury of a large number of people with various injuries,” it added.
“Hezbollah’s competent agencies are currently conducting a wide-ranging security and scientific investigation to determine the causes that led to these simultaneous explosions. Likewise, medical and health agencies are treating the wounded and injured in a number of hospitals in various Lebanese regions,” Hezbollah continued.
“We affirm that the resistance, at all its levels and various units, is at the highest level of readiness to defend Lebanon and its steadfast people.”
No confirmation from Israeli side
Nothing from Israel just yet. There was one person who used to be, according to Israeli media, a spokesperson in the Israeli prime minister’s office who commented on this, alleging that Israel was behind this.
But the Israeli prime minister’s office released a statement distancing themselves from this individual, saying that he’s “not in the circle of consultations”.
According to one Israeli channel, the prime minister has given a directive to his government and ministers to not talk about what took place in Lebanon, to not conduct interviews or to enter into any sort of discussions about the matter.
Additionally, the heads of town, cities and settlements in Israel’s north have been notified by Home Front Command of a possibility of an escalation but that there are no changes in the directives of security measures at this time.
But it’s not really uncommon for Israel to not speak about something like this if, indeed, they are the ones behind it because Israel’s external security agency, the Mossad, has a lot of different capabilities and specialises in things like hacking and assassinations abroad.
So this falls within the realm of the expertise of the Mossad, but of course, there is no confirmation from the Israeli side.
