The health minister of Lebanon reports that nine people, including a toddler, have died as a result of the country’s portable pagers, which were used by Hezbollah members as a means of communication, exploding all over the place.
Among the 2,800 persons injured by the coordinated explosions in Beirut and numerous other areas was Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon.
Iran-backed Hezbollah confirmed the deaths of eight fighters and said the pagers belonged “to employees of various Hezbollah units and institutions.”The organisation promised to exact “just retribution” on Israel for what it described as “this criminal aggression.” The Israeli military remained silent on the matter.
“After pager explosives that leave thousands injured and nine dead in Lebanon, Hezbollah blames Israel.”
A few hours prior to the blasts, the Israeli security cabinet said that one of the official war objectives was to halt Hezbollah’s strikes in the country’s north so that displaced citizens could return safely.
Since the day following the beginning of Israel’s conflict with Hamas in Gaza on October 7, there have been nearly daily gunfire exchanges over the Israel-Lebanon border.
Hezbollah has declared its support for the Palestinian group supported by Iran.
Wednesday saw Hezbollah release a statement in which it said that it will continue its “operations in support of Gaza,” adding that this was a “continuous path separate from the hard price that awaits the enemy in response to its massacre on Tuesday”.Israel, the UK, and other nations have designated Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist groups.
The most recent events in Lebanon are “extremely concerning, especially given that this is taking place within a context that is extremely volatile,” according to a UN spokeswoman.On Tuesday night, a lot of people in Lebanon were in a state of shock and disbelief, unable to comprehend the scope and character of an incident that had never been seen before.
According to Hezbollah, pagers of an undisclosed quantity burst at about 15:30 local time (12:30 GMT) in the capital Beirut and several other regions. The party mainly depends on these devices for communications because mobile phones run the danger of being hacked or traced.
In one CCTV clip, an explosion was seen in a man’s grocery store pocket or bag. As other consumers flee for their lives, he is then seen falling backwards to the ground and sobbing in agony.
After many hours, the sheer number of casualties—200 of them, according to the health minister, were in severe condition—still had ambulances racing to hospitals. Family members were waiting outside, hoping for news.
The main gate of the LAU Medical Centre, located in the Ashrafieh suburb of Beirut, was locked, and entry was restricted. A staff member told the BBC that “some scenes are horrific and it’s very sensitive.”
He stated that the majority of the injuries were to the hands, face, waist, and eyes. “Many casualties have lost fingers, in some cases all of them,” he continued.Mojtaba Amani, the Iranian ambassador, was “slightly injured” by one of the explosions, according to his wife, and he was “doing well” in the hospital.
The official Hezbollah media office declared the eight fighters dead. It just stated that they were “martyred on the road to Jerusalem,” providing no information about the places or circumstances.
The AFP news agency was informed by a source close to the party that among the dead were the 10-year-old daughter of a Hezbollah member in the Bekaa Valley and the son of Hezbollah MP Ali Ammar. The source then claimed that Hassan Fadlallah, the son of another legislator, had been injured after first claiming to be dead.
According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, fourteen more persons were injured by detonating pagers in neighbouring Syria, where Hezbollah is battling alongside government troops in the nation’s civil conflict.”We fully hold the Israeli enemy accountable for this criminal aggression,” a statement released by Hezbollah stated on Tuesday night.
“This deceitful and unlawful adversary will undoubtedly receive his rightful punishment for this wicked assault, both in areas where it matters and doesn’t,” it said.Israel was also held accountable for the explosions, according to Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati, who called them a “serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards.”
Abbas Araghchi, the foreign minister of Iran, stated that he “strongly condemned Israeli terrorism” to his colleague in Lebanon.The closest ally of Israel, the US, denied any participation and pleaded with Iran not to escalate tensions.Hezbollah remained silent on what it thought was the reason for the pager explosions.The impacted gadgets were from a fresh shipment that Hezbollah had received recently, according to a source that was quoted by The Wall Street Journal. The publication was reportedly told by a Hezbollah official that several persons had noticed the pagers heating up before to the explosions.
Although experts noted that hacking into the pagers and causing them to overheat would not typically produce such explosions, overheated lithium-ion batteries can catch fire.The BBC was informed by an anonymous former British Army weapons specialist that the pagers were probably loaded with 10–20 grammes of military-grade high explosive concealed within a phoney electronic component.The next individual to use the gadget would have set off the bomb after it was armed by a signal, known as an alphanumeric text message, the expert added.
“Israel has been engaging in cyber operations against Hezbollah for several months, but this security breach is the largest in scale,” said Lina Khatib, a Middle East expert at the Chatham House think tank in the UK, in an interview with the BBC.
According to American think tank the Atlantic Council senior fellow Nicholas Blanford, who is headquartered in Beirut, “Israel in one fell swoop has rendered combat ineffective hundreds, if not thousands of Hezbollah fighters, in some cases permanently.”He called it “the most dangerous moment” in the Hezbollah-Israel confrontation since October and issued a warning, saying that the organization’s commanders would now “face extreme pressure from the ranks and supporters to retaliate heavily.”The Israeli military released a statement on Tuesday night that stated that commanders had conducted a situational assessment with Chief of Staff Lt Gen Herzi Halevi, “focussing on readiness in both offence and defence in all arenas,” but it made no mention of the pager explosions.
Additionally, it informed the Israeli people that defence guidelines were unchanged and urged them to maintain their vigilance.
Three “Hezbollah terrorists operating within a terrorist infrastructure site” were slain by an airstrike earlier in the day in the Blida area, which is close to Lebanon’s border with Israel, according to the military.Hezbollah’s propaganda office said it had launched missile and drone assaults against Israeli troops and military installations, while the health ministry of Lebanon reported that three people had died in an Israeli strike.
The Hezbollah bombing attempt on an unidentified former top Israeli security officer was thwarted, according to Israel’s Shin Bet internal security agency. Hezbollah remained silent in response to the charge.
This coincides with the government of Israel promising to intensify military operations against Hezbollah.
On Tuesday morning, Israel’s security cabinet proclaimed the safe return of 60,000 citizens displaced in the north by Hezbollah assaults an official goal of the Gaza conflict.Defence Minister Yoav Gallant claimed during a meeting with US ambassador Amos Hochstein on Monday that the only option to repatriate northern residents was by “military action”.
According to a statement from his office, “the window of opportunity for an agreement is closing as Hezbollah continues to ‘tie itself’ to Hamas, and refuses to end the conflict.”The Lebanese health ministry reports that at least 589 individuals have died in Lebanon since the hostilities began in October, with Hezbollah members accounting for the great bulk of these deaths.
According to the Israeli government, there have been 21 security force fatalities and 25 civilian deaths.
[BBC]
