Netanyahu approved pager attacks against Hezbollah, spokesman says

Jerusalem: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved pager attacks that dealt a deadly blow to the Iran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah in September, a spokesperson for his office said on Monday.

The Israeli military, which has been engaged in cross-border fighting with Hezbollah since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, at first declined to respond to questions about the detonations.

Pagers exploded in homes and on the streets of Lebanon in September.Credit: Screengrab

On September 17, thousands of pagers simultaneously exploded in the southern suburbs of Beirut and other Hezbollah strongholds, in most cases after the devices beeped, indicating an incoming message.

A Hezbollah official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the incident was the “biggest security breach” for the group in nearly a year of conflict with Israel.

Many victims rushed to hospital had eye injuries, missing fingers or gaping holes in their abdomens, according to Reuters witnesses.

The pager attack and a second attack the following day that activated weaponised walkie-talkies killed 39 people and wounded more than 3400 in total.

Israeli media reported that Netanyahu claimed responsibility for the attack during a cabinet meeting, telling ministers that senior defence officials and political figures were opposed to the detonation of the pagers but that he proceeded with the operation.

A spokesman for his office, Omer Dostri, confirmed his approval.

Hezbollah fighters have been using pagers as a low-tech means of communication in an attempt to evade Israeli location-tracking, two sources familiar with the group’s operations said this year. A pager is a wireless telecommunications device that receives and displays messages.

Israel followed up the pager detonations with the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in an airstrike and the launching of incursions in south Lebanon.

Israel strikes in Lebanon, Gaza

Israeli strikes killed dozens of people, including children, on Sunday in Lebanon and isolated northern Gaza as the world watched for signs of how the US election might affect the wars between Israel and Iranian-backed militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah.

Palestinians at the site of an Israeli strike in the courtyard of a hospital where displaced people live in tents, in Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip on Saturday.Credit: AP

Netanyahu said he had spoken three times with Donald Trump since Tuesday’s election, and they “see eye to eye regarding the Iranian threat and all of its components”.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog is scheduled to meet US President Joe Biden on Tuesday.

The Israeli airstrike in Lebanon killed at least 23 people, including seven children, in Aalmat village, north of Beirut, far from the areas in the east and south where Hezbollah has a major presence. There was no Israeli evacuation warning. Israel’s military said that it hit a Hezbollah site used to store weapons, and the strike was under review.

Hezbollah began firing rockets, drones and missiles into Israel after war broke out in Gaza, in solidarity with the Palestinians and Hamas. Israel retaliated, and a series of escalations have led to all-out war.

In northern Gaza, an Israeli strike on a home sheltering displaced people in the urban refugee camp of Jabaliya killed at least 17 people, including nine women, according to Dr Fadel Naim, director of Al-Ahly Hospital in Gaza City.

Israel’s military said that it targeted a site where militants were operating. It said the details of the strike were under review.

A separate strike hit a house in Gaza City, killing Wael al-Khour, a minister in the Hamas-run government, as well as his wife and three children, according to the Civil Defence first responders who operate under the government.

An Israeli airstrike killed seven people late on Monday at a cafe near the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, Palestinian medics said, bringing the death toll from Israeli strikes since Sunday night to at least 37.

Israel strikes deeper into Lebanon

Israel has struck deeper inside Lebanon since September, when it killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and most of his top commanders. Hezbollah has expanded its rocket fire from northern to central Israel. The fighting has killed more than 3100 people in Lebanon, according to the Health Ministry, and more than 70 people in Israel.

After Israel’s strike in Aalmat, around 40 kilometres north of Beirut, legislator Raed Berro denied that any Hezbollah personnel or assets were in the building hit.

A woman gathers her belongings in an apartment in Baalbek, Lebanon, after an Israeli airstrike killed nine people the previous day.Credit: Getty Images

“Everyone can see, in front of cameras, that what is being pulled from under the rubble are women, children and elderly people who have nothing to do with weapons or rocket warehouses,” Berro said.

Hassan Ghaddaf, who lived next door and was slightly wounded while heading to his balcony with morning coffee, said displaced people were in the building.

“I had seen them and got to know them the other day,” Ghaddaf said. “They were peaceful. On the contrary, they had someone from the Lebanese Internal Security Forces that works for the state, and we saw their garb and clothes in the rubble.”

In Syria, an Israeli airstrike hit a residential building in the Damascus suburb of Sayyida Zeinab, and the Defence Ministry said that seven civilians were killed, state news agency SANA reported.

Britain-based opposition war monitor The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights suggested that Hezbollah was targeted. Israel didn’t immediately comment.

Fears of famine in northern Gaza

The mid-month deadline is approaching for the Biden administration’s ultimatum for Israel: allow more aid into Gaza or risk possible restrictions on US military funding.

Israel said on Monday it had met most US demands to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza but was still discussing some items as the deadline loomed.

An Israeli official told reporters that a number of issues remain under discussion, and they touch on safety issues. He said most issues had been addressed.

Among the US demands that Israel appears to have refused is allowing the entry of 50 to 100 commercial trucks a day.

The official said commercial activity had been halted because Hamas was controlling the merchants. Restrictions on the entry of closed containers would also not be lifted due to security risks, the official said.

Others, including the opening of a fifth crossing into Gaza, had been implemented.

The US told its ally Israel in a letter on October 13 that it must take steps to improve the aid situation within 30 days, with Tuesday as the final deadline.

Last week, the State Department said Israel had taken some measures to increase aid access to Gaza but had so far failed to significantly turn around the humanitarian situation.

Israeli forces have encircled and largely isolated Jabaliya and the nearby northern Gaza towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun for the past month, allowing only a trickle of humanitarian aid. Experts from a panel that monitors food security say famine is imminent or may already be happening.

The northern third of Gaza, including Gaza City, has suffered the heaviest destruction of the 13-month war. Israel has sent forces back in, saying Hamas has regrouped.

Israeli strikes often kill women and children. The military says it only targets militants, whom it accuses of hiding among civilians.

Tents are crammed together as displaced Palestinians camp along the beach of Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip, last month. Credit: AP

Also on Sunday, Israel’s military released what it called footage of Hamas abusing detainees. The soundless footage, dated from 2018 to 2020, appears to show hooded detainees chained in stress positions. In some clips, men beat or poke them with batons. It wasn’t possible to independently verify the videos, which the military said that it recovered during operations in Gaza.

Rights groups have long accused the Hamas-run government in Gaza and the Western-backed Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank of abusing detainees and violently quashing dissent.

Israel has been accused of similar abuses, especially since the start of the war. Israeli prison authorities say they follow relevant laws and investigate allegations of wrongdoing.

The toll of war

The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, and killed around 1200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted about 250. Around 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, and about a third are believed to be dead.

Israel’s offensive has killed more than 43,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities who don’t distinguish between civilians and militants in their count but say more than half the dead were women and children.

Israeli bombardment and ground invasions have left vast areas of Gaza in ruins.Credit: Getty Images

Israeli bombardment and ground invasions have left vast areas of Gaza in ruins and displaced around 90 per cent of the population of 2.3 million people, often multiple times. Hundreds of thousands live in tent camps with few, if any, services.

Ceasefire talks mediated by the United States, Qatar and Egypt have repeatedly stalled, as have parallel efforts by the US and others to halt the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.

Qatar, a key mediator with Hamas, said on Saturday that it had suspended its efforts and would resume them when “the parties show their willingness and seriousness to end the brutal war”.

Some Palestinians in Gaza responded with frustration.

“The Arab silence that controls the Arab capitals, that’s because of the fear of the American administration and Israel,” said Akram Jarada, displaced from Gaza City.

AP, Reuters

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