What we know about the deadly pager blasts in Lebanon

At least nine people were killed and nearly 3000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members - including fighters and medics - detonated simultaneously across Lebanon.

An ambulance carrying people wounded when their handheld pagers exploded arrives at the American University hospital in Beirut, Lebanon.Credit: AP

What happened in Lebanon and Syria?

The detonations started about 3.30pm local time (10.30pm AEST) in the southern suburbs of Beirut, known as Dahiyeh, and in the eastern Bekaa valley - strongholds of the anti-Israel militant group Hezbollah. Lebanese security officials and a Hezbollah official told AP there had also been blasts in Damascus, Syria.

They lasted about an hour, with witnesses and residents of Dahiyeh telling Reuters they could still hear explosions at 4.30pm.

According to security sources and footage reviewed by Reuters, some of the detonations took place after the pagers rang, causing the victims to put their hands on them or bring them up to their faces to check the screens.

How did the pagers explode?

The New York Times reports that Israel carried out its operation against Hezbollah by hiding explosives within a new batch of Taiwanese-made pagers imported into Lebanon. The media outlet cited US and other officials who had been briefed on the operation.

The pagers had been tampered with before they reached Lebanon, officials told the Times.

A security source told Reuters that up to three grams of explosives were hidden in the new pagers and had gone “undetected” by Hezbollah for months.

They were detonated after a message arrived appearing to be from Hezbollah’s leaders. The message instead activated the explosives after beeping for several seconds.

Images of destroyed pagers analysed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo, a Taiwan-based pager manufacturer.

Taiwan’s Gold Apollo did not make the pagers that were used in the detonations in Lebanon on Tuesday, the company’s founder Hsu Ching-Kuang told reporters on Wednesday.

Hsu said the pagers used in the explosion were made by a company in Europe that had the right to use the Taiwanese firm’s brand.

“The product was not ours. It was only that it had our brand on it,” he said.

Why does Hezbollah use pagers?

Hezbollah fighters had begun using pagers as a low-tech means to try and prevent Israeli tracking of their locations, two sources familiar with the group’s operations told Reuters this year.

Three security sources told Reuters that the pagers that detonated were the latest model brought in by Hezbollah in recent months.

In two separate clips from the CCTV footage of supermarkets, the blasts appeared to only wound the person wearing the pager or closest to it.

The blasts were relatively contained, according to footage reviewed by Reuters. The blasts did not appear to cause major damage or start any fires.

Footage shot at hospitals and shared on social media appeared to show individuals with injuries of varying degrees, including to the face, missing fingers and gaping wounds at the hip where the pager was likely worn.

Is Israel being blamed?

A senior Lebanese security source and another source told Reuters that Israel’s Mossad spy agency planted a small amount of explosives inside the pagers ordered by Lebanese group Hezbollah months before Tuesday’s detonations.

Israel’s military declined to respond to Reuters questions on the pager blasts.

Lebanon’s foreign ministry called the explosions an “Israeli cyberattack” but did not provide details on how it had reached that conclusion.

Lebanon’s information minister said the attack was an assault on Lebanon’s sovereignty.

The US State Department said Washington was gathering information and was not involved. The Pentagon said there was no change in US force posture in the Middle East in the wake of the incident.

Who is Hezbollah?

Hezbollah is both a Shiite political party in Lebanon and a militant group. Regional power Iran backs Hezbollah and uses it as a proxy to attack Israel.

Iran is a regional enemy of Israel and has made the destruction of Israel a key political aspiration.

There is a threat of escalation between Israel and Hezbollah, with exchanges of cross-border fire since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza last October.

But experts are more sceptical, for now, about the potential for triggering an imminent all-out Israel-Hezbollah war, which the US has sought to prevent and which it believes neither side wants.

Reuters

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