In an operation of quite astonishing boldness and professionalism, the Israelis have struck a telling blow at their long-term enemy Hezbollah.
At approximately 13:45 BST, pagers which had been distributed by the terrorist organisation to its members and supporters began to explode, in an almost simultaneous series of events which lasted roughly half an hour.
Complete confusion ensued in Lebanon and parts of Syria as multiple individuals – presumably all associated in some way with Hezbollah – were wounded and otherwise incapacitated as the electronic devices exploded in their hands, pockets, waist belts, and shopping bags.
Some twelve people appeared to have been killed by current reckoning, and possibly as many as 3,000 wounded in some way, some losing hands and fingers and others their eyesight. Deep abdominal wounds have also been reported in those who had their pagers on their belts.
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What appears to have happened here is both fascinating and infinitely complex. It looks like what we have is an example of a “supply chain attack”, in which the Israeli security services have been able to intercept an order made for the said pagers by Hezbollah and doctor the devices by inserting small amounts of military grade explosives plus detonators. Nobody knows how this might have happened, and the Israelis are quite rightly staying schtum. I would if I were them, to be honest.
Make no mistake, if this is what has actually occurred it represents a major military coup for Israel and a humiliating embarrassment for Hezbollah. Having ordered its fighters and associated acolytes to abandon their mobile phones for fear of them being tracked and targeted, its reversionary mode of communication has been totally exploited by their sworn enemy. Once again Israel has proved to be ahead of the game.
Incidentally, it transpires that Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani, was slightly injured in the wave of explosions. I wonder why he was in possession of a Hezbollah-supplied pager? Is there some connection here?
It now transpires that there has been a second wave of attacks on Hezbollah communications devices, this time involving walkie-talkies and other similar devices. Apparently “thousands” of hand-held communications devices exploded in Lebanon on Wednesday afternoon, with explosions being heard in the southern suburbs of Beirut, as well as the cities of Nabatieh, Tyre, and Saida in southern Lebanon. There are reports that nine people have been killed and another 300 injured in this second wave of attacks. The Israelis clearly aren’t finished yet.
What will happen next? Nobody knows, but with perhaps thousands of Hezbollah fighters wounded and disabled, it will take the terrorists some time to recover and regroup. Those veterans who have lost fingers and hands, or perhaps their eyesight, will now find it difficult to dress and feed themselves let alone fire their rifles and missiles at the IDF. If you live by the sword you can expect to die by the sword. I have little sympathy for them.
Of course, Hezbollah has sworn revenge but there doesn’t appear to be anything significant they can do in the short term. They have been struck pre-emptively, if you like, and it’ll take them some time to pick up the pieces. But I don’t think they’re done and dusted, nor have they gone away. They’ll still be a thorn in the side of Israel on its northern border. And I can’t see wiser heads prevailing in the short to medium term either. Hezbollah, and Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the various other jihadist groups and ne’er-do-wells aren’t going to just give up. I don’t think Iran will let them.
They have, however, been taught a severe lesson. Israel, philosophically, intellectually, and practically, is way ahead of them, and there’s no sign of the gap closing. Their best option, in my opinion, is to seek peace. Peace always involves compromises and swallowing of pride, but that’s a price worth paying. By both sides.
Lt Col Stuart Crawford is a political and defence commentator and former army officer. Sign up for his podcasts and newsletters at www.DefenceReview.uk.
Yesterday we had a headline that confused Brimstone with Hellfire, and now we seemingly have one that confuses Hisbollah with Hamas. C’mon folks. Take the extra 5 mins.
One particular quick i’ve personally noticed, is that all corrections & amendments should be noted at the bottom of the article, but are often not.
Indeed for both.
Hisb’ollah have fired rockets consistently into Northern Israel causing its evacuation. Southern Lebanon is doubtlessly in the same state. It’s time the Palestinians told Iran where to stuff their money, because it’s not helping their people to be in a constant state of conflict. Others would fund the Palestianians to be peaceful and to rebuild (not to mention their own offshore oil/gas wealth).
Booby traps are a violation of international law
Yes, which is why they will never admit to it.
I would hope Mossad regret any children having the misfortune to be in the firing line when these things went off, but consider that a price worth paying for the damage inflicted on their targets.
I think this is a brilliant operation and a coup worthy of any spy thriller.
These were not booby traps, which term doesn’t cover deliberate remote detonation. Let’s narrow your statement down, because it’s just too woolly to be helpful. The law we are talking about is The Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) to which Israel is a signatory and Hisbollah isn’t (although the latter shouldn’t matter). Article 6(1) prohibits in all circumstances to use (a) any booby-trap in the form of an apparently harmless portable object which is specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material and to detonate when it is disturbed or approached These pagers are not booby traps within the… Read more »
👍
One can argue this before international tribunals but in the end, it will all depend who the judges are … generally, international law is whatever the victor says it is.
It is a brilliant operation. Stuff “international laws and liberal opinions”. They are terrorist scum.
If the device was actively & successfully targetting the enemy I think that will be the end of the matter. That sort of international law is designed to safeguard non combatants. If the devices achieved that, in the most part, I cannot see where the they can go with that.
Israel intends to survive whatever can be thrown at them hopefully within international law. However the safety of Israelis is paramount – they can’t have their day in court if they are dead.
😚
Booby traps are a violation of international law. Strange that never cames up when talking about indiscriminate Palestinian and Heezbollah rocket firing. You not even made reference about their bobby traps. ——- Side note: US Army manual, allows under an officer order that its soldiers engage in unlawful combat to prevent and deter the other side from engaging in it. The reason gas was not used in WW2 combat was because you can be sure the allies and would have responded in kind. That is also the reason UK have the Nuclear Deterrent, is to incinerate enemy entire cities in… Read more »
Just shows what an agency who is oblivious to sensitive liberal and whingy opinion can achieve. Against terrorists? Anything to wipe them out is good to me.
I don’t think that is correct, If Israel did not cared for civilians would have put more explosive in it and those Heezbollah would have died instead of being hurt.and maybe still able to attack Israel again.
I suspect they put as much explosive as they could fit in the pagers. The devices are small and have little in the way of void spaces in them. In the real world, even the most powerful chemical explosives aren’t going to cause devastation in gram quantities.
It’s quite possible that the idea was to maim rather than kill. You kill and then have a martyr. You maim and you have someone who need medical and personal care (using scares resources), and is also a constant reminder of what your opponent did and is capable of doing again.
yes, also makes possible to establish a connection.
No, it is enough grams.
PETN was put into Italian 12.7 Breda SAFAT rounds, it was destructive when hit British aircraft.
This was a brilliantly planned and executed attack against a known terrorist organisation. Supply radios and pagers to aid the terrorist organisation Comms. Plant a detonator and explosive device inside and then …when the time is right….set them off.
Probably injured or killed 50% of Hezbollahs top fighters and senior leadership.
Well done Mosad.
I don’t think lasting peace is an option. That hope has always depended on a two state solution. But Israel’s continued expansion of settlements in the West Bank is making that all but impossible. There is no chance that any Israeli government would impose, on a far larger scale, the forced abandonment of settlements that was enacted in Gaza.
Yes but remember that it was Jordan invaded the West Bank in 1949 and then evicted Jews from the Jewish Quarter of the Old City before starving and bombarding Jews trapped in West Jerusalem! Kaliningrad used to be part of Germany but do we now call it occupied territory?
The point is that for the palastinians peace is the only option. Israel cannot seriously be beaten. Hamas and Herzbollah need to welcome in the UN – hand over their weapons and disband. Under the protection of the UN they need to open up their economy and put all of their efforts towards peaceful activities gaining assistance from their neighbour into putting their land into productive use. They should ask for a two state solution once the UN is seen not to be needed. Even Israel will not continue the fight once their enemies have thrown their weapons into the… Read more »
Isreal will never accept a two state solution . They will stop when the Palestinians no longer exist.
Quite possibly. Having said that I never thought there would be peace in NI. How wrong was I? Personally I think the Israelis would stop once there was no threat. They simply want to live in peace which is difficult when surrounded by hostile people. What seems certain is they will always fight if attacked. Prior to Oct 7th things had been relatively quiet. Even the Israelis know they don’t want to keep fighting everyone.
Israel has accepted a 2-state solution 6 or 7 times in the past. It’s always the Palestinians who reject it. They even withdrew settlements from large areas following the last agreement
Israel has never accepted a two state solution.
Only if they are idiots they will accept a state to their side that wants to destroy them.
Given the historical record of Israel/Palestine for at least the last hundred years (but in reality several nillenia), it may well be a reasonably accurate assessment to state that the Israeli Jews and the Palestinians do not play together well in the same sandbox, or even contiguous ones. The status quo of repetitive violence could be resolved by at least two different methods: 1.) Permit the conflict to devolve into total war, Old Testament style, by default. The Israelis willl iquidate the Palestinian population by combination of genocide and ethnic cleansing (emigration of remnant of Palestinians to Jordan, etc.). The… Read more »
…millennia…🙄
…characteristics…🙄☹️
Palestine wasn’t even a concept until the 1960’s (allegedly dreamt up by the KGB to cause trouble for Israel & the wider West). Even leaders of the PLO admitted that Palestine didn’t really exist, so no millenia-long struggle. The region was named Syria Palaestina by the Romans and the name was revived by the British during the Mandate. In between it was known by different names and ruled by many different empires, but one thing was constant – there was never a country by that name, only an imperial administrative district. The reality is that most present day “Palestinians” are… Read more »
Thanks for the tutorial re history of area pre-British mandate. 👍 Significantly more well versed from that time period
to the present. Basic contention is that two state solution is the only reasonably viable sol’n. Proposed difference would be the element of significant geographical separation.
2 state solution is not viable when Palestinians wants to destroy Israel.
Wrong. What “From the river to the sea” means for you?
That have been the “discussion” since Palestinians appeared in 1967.
Maybe you should listen to Arab channels to know what Palestinians groups are.
Two points Peter,
Israel allowing illegal settlements in the West Bank is not acceptable, it’s bleeding obvious that a solid two state solution is the only eventual answer.
However, as long as a vile hard line Islamic regime sits in Tehran, there will never be peace of any description in the entire region.
You need to drain the swamp first.
It’s awful for the poor long suffering people’s of Iran too, that appalling regime has its boot on their thoats.
This is an old tactic that western counter-insurgency efforts have exploited in the past. Not so much these days because the collateral damage tends to create more enemies. We know that the Israelis interrupted a supply chain and concealed explosives in pagers. Do we have any way to verify whether those pagers all made their way into the hands of actual insurgents (given that there are still plenty of legitimate uses for pagers, particularly in environments where mobile ‘phone coverage is degraded)?
Don’t you get it? The explosions weren’t the operation. The Israelis have probably had access to Hisbollah’s communications for months. Every time a pager was used, every call made on the walkie-talkies, was being monitored. They’d have known exactly who had hold of every single device and their locations. The explosions were just the final eff-you.
The IRA used letter bombs, old fashioned method of communication.
Vaguely disquieting to contemplate the next iteration of this type of campaign: possible sabotage of the Android phones and the i-Phones utilized by the decadent, capitalist, Judeo-Christian infidels? Perhaps an object lesson for the West to redouble efforts to secure product supply chains? 🤔😳
Obviously exploding bombs in homes and shops is a legitimate military tactic.
Except it it isn’t.
It’s terrorism.
It is a legitimate tactic when used against aimed insurgents hiding amongst civilians hoping to exploit racist reporting to use civilian casualties against the victims of genocide.
It is terrorism when used for genocide against Israel or the West.
The attack was against the political arm. They were not even combatants. BTW the EU and UK did not classify Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation for many years because they don’t carry out terrorist attacks. They perform exactly the same actions as the IDF.
They are not insurgents and do not and have never attacked the West. They purely defend against Israeli occupation of Lebanon.
This is why they were not banned as a terrorist organisation until we were pressurised by the US.
Purely defend against Isreali occupation of Lebanon…. Erm nope they have committed violent acts against Lebanons own Christian population.. for heavens sake step outside the bubble.
You lying. Heezbollah have carried terrorist attacks Including against enemies in Lebanon.
Explain what happened to the French and US Army barracks in Beirut.
Hizballah (Party of God) – Proscribed March 2019 Hizballah is committed to armed resistance to the state of Israel and aims to seize all Palestinian territories and Jerusalem from Israel. It supports terrorism in Iraq and the Palestinian territories. Hizballah was established during the Lebanese civil war and in the aftermath of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. Hizballah is committed to armed resistance to the state of Israel and aims to seize all Palestinian territories and Jerusalem from Israel. It supports terrorism in Iraq and the Palestinian territories. Hizballah continues to amass an arsenal of weapons in Lebanon,… Read more »
Political arm. I suggest you reach out to some Lebonese Christians to find out more about this Political party you seem to think are harmless. Christians face harassment from the Muslim majority, including denial of land acquisition and increased tax rates. Christians have faced multiple attacks, including a 2018 attack on a Christian political party headquarters by the Hizballah-affiliated Amal movement. In 2019, Hizballah and Amal members attacked a Christian neighborhood to intimidate In April 2024, a local official of the Lebanese Forces (LF), a Christian political party, was kidnapped and his body was found in Syria. In August 2023,… Read more »
Lets face it, people’s view on whether this was a finely executed operation and brilliant plan, or not, is dictated by their overriding political opinion of the running conflicts between Palestinians and Israel.
Not sure how you can call something professional when they indiscrimately killed woman and children or civilians to get at their targets. That is no better than a terrorist organisation. The approach was clearly clever but it gave zero room to consider where the targets might be or even if they were near the exploding devices.
Do you even know what indiscriminate means?
Maybe you can answer this question . The allied coalition that took Mosul from ISIS killed how many women and children.
And how many civilian deaths the US; UK and generally western airforces admit they killed combating ISIS?
It’s always a good day when a disingenuous and lets be honest evil terrorist organisation that rejoices in the deaths of Jews and Westerners get’s kicked to death. The word Hezbollah will now forever be associated not with fear but instead with a morality tale of appalling things happening to bad people who do bad things.
From the liver to the knee….