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Update (09/18): Israel manufactured the exploding pagers used in its anti-Hezbollah operation


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APNEWS.COM

A Hezbollah official tells The Associated Press that “several hundred” people, including members of the group, were wounded in different parts of Lebanon when their handheld pagers exploded.

 

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Dozens of people, including Iran’s ambassador, were wounded in Beirut’s suburbs and other parts of Lebanon after their handheld pagers exploded Tuesday, according to media reports and security officials. It wasn’t immediately clear if people were killed.

 

A senior military intelligence official and an official with a Lebanese group with knowledge of the situation, both of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said that pagers carried by Hezbollah members were detonated. The second official said it was believed to be an Israeli attack.

 

The Associated Press reached out to the Israeli military, which declined to comment.

 

 

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  • Commissar SFLUFAN changed the title to "Dozens" of people - including Iranian ambassador - injured across Lebanon due to exploding pagers

The AP has updated its story to reflect information from the Lebanese government that at least eight people have been killed (including a 10 year-old girl) and more than 2,750 injured.

 

APNEWS.COM

Hezbollah officials tell The Associated Press that at least two of its members and a girl were killed, and several hundred were wounded, when the new brand of pagers used by the militant group exploded across Lebanon and Syria.

 

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Hundreds of handheld pagers exploded near simultaneously across Lebanon and in parts of Syria on Tuesday, killing at least eight people, including members of the militant group Hezbollah and a girl, and wounding the Iranian ambassador, government and Hezbollah officials said.

 

Officials pointed the finger at Israel in what appeared to be a sophisticated, remote attack that wounded more than 2,700 people at a time of rising tensions across the Lebanon border.

 

The Israeli military declined to comment.

 

A Hezbollah official who spoke on condition of anonymity told The Associated Press that the new brand of handheld pagers used by the group first heated up, then exploded, killing at least two of its members and wounding others.

 

Lebanon’s health minister, Firas Abiad, said at least eight people were killed and 2,750 wounded — 200 of them critically.

 

Iranian state-run IRNA news agency said that the country’s ambassador, Mojtaba Amani, was superficially wounded by an exploding pager and was being treated at a hospital.

 

Photos and videos from Beirut’s southern suburbs circulating on social media and in local media showed people lying on the pavement with wounds on their hands or near their pants pockets.

 

 

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  • Commissar SFLUFAN changed the title to Update: Lebanese government reporting at least 8 fatalities/2,750 injuries from near-simultaneous explosions of pagers across the country

I'm really confused how this would have gone down. Two ideas:

  1. Israel manufactured a type of pager with a small explosive, and then used contacts to get Hezbollah to buy them
  2. Israel figured out which specific model of pager (and which ones) Hezbollah was using, and then performed some kind of motherboard attack that caused the lithium battery to overheat and explode?
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Just now, CitizenVectron said:

I'm really confused how this would have gone down. Two ideas:

  1. Israel manufactured a type of pager with a small explosive, and then used contacts to get Hezbollah to buy them
  2. Israel figured out which specific model of pager (and which ones) Hezbollah was using, and then performed some kind of motherboard attack that caused the lithium battery to overheat and explode?

 

I'm going with the former. Like I said this is like a Tom Clancy novel.

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Just now, CitizenVectron said:

I'm really confused how this would have gone down. Two ideas:

  1. Israel manufactured a type of pager with a small explosive, and then used contacts to get Hezbollah to buy them
  2. Israel figured out which specific model of pager (and which ones) Hezbollah was using, and then performed some kind of motherboard attack that caused the lithium battery to overheat and explode?

 

I'm leaning towards the first option, are pagers still made? I imagine sourcing 1,200 pagers isn't easy, but very easy if Hezbollah Bob's cousin's uncle has an electronics company that has a bunch in storage. 

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  • Commissar SFLUFAN changed the title to Lebanese government reporting at least 8 fatalities/2,750 injuries from near-simultaneous explosions of pagers across the country
2 hours ago, CitizenVectron said:

I'm really confused how this would have gone down. Two ideas:

  1. Israel manufactured a type of pager with a small explosive, and then used contacts to get Hezbollah to buy them
  2. Israel figured out which specific model of pager (and which ones) Hezbollah was using, and then performed some kind of motherboard attack that caused the lithium battery to overheat and explode?

 

The Post has a video of one of the explosions in their story. I feel pretty confident that that is not the result of an unaltered battery exploding, no matter what you do to it. Someone must have put something else in the pagers.

 

Crazy Tom Clancy vibes here. 

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10 minutes ago, TwinIon said:

The Post has a video of one of the explosions in their story. I feel pretty confident that that is not the result of an unaltered battery exploding, no matter what you do to it. Someone must have put something else in the pagers.

 

I just have difficulty believing that the Israelis could've infiltrated whatever amount (no matter how small a quantity) of Semtex or similar plastic explosives into the devices and still have them function normally which I assume they were until a few hours ago.  I'm still leaning towards an altered battery being the explosive catalyst.

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