Hezbollah pagers explode: What we know about Israel’s attack

More details have emerged about what led Israel to detonate pagers belonging to Hezbollah operatives in an unprecedented attack. Here’s what we know.

Hezbollah has vowed to retaliate after hundreds of pagers exploded across Lebanon at the same time in an apparent co-ordinated deadly attack that is being blamed on Israel.

American officials have claimed Israel carried out the attack, which killed 12 people and wounded at least 2,800, by planting explosives in Hezbollah’s shipment of pagers.

Here’s what we know so far.

WAS THE PAGER ATTACK BROUGHT FORWARD?

Israeli officials brought forward the plan detonate the pagers carried by Hezbollah operatives over concerns that the terror group might have uncovered their plot, it has been claimed.

Sources told Axios that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his officials sped up the co-ordinated attack when intelligence briefings in recent days suggested Hezbollah might have detected the explosives allegedly placed inside their pagers.

Additional sources claimed the decision to launch the second wave of explosions targeting walkie-talkie radio used by Hezbollah, was also brought forward over concerns that the terrorists would ditch the devices, Axios reported.

WHO IS BEING BLAMED FOR THE ATTACK?

Mossad, the covert Israeli foreign intelligence service, is said to have infiltrated the supply chain and tampered with the shipment of pagers from Taiwan.

Some analysts believe Mossad agents rigged the pagers with hidden explosives after intercepting the devices and primed them to be detonated remotely on demand.

An ambulance rushes wounded people to the American University of Beirut Medical Centre after hundreds of pagers exploded across Lebanon. Picture: AFP

Sky News Arabia reported that Mossad agents placed a small quantity of PETN, a highly explosive material, on the batteries of the devices.

Other experts suggested the lithium batteries inside the devices were made to overheat and explode by a possible cyber breach.

However, cybersecurity experts told The New York Times that the “strength and speed” of the explosions, as seen in the footage of the blasts, indicated explosive material was involved and that it was not just a case of overheated batteries.

WHY WAS HEZBOLLAH USING PAGERS?

The use of pagers was preferred by Hezbollah over smartphones for security reasons after the terror group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, previously warned fighters not to carry smartphones as they could be used to track their movements.

The pagers were seen by the terror group’s leaders as a low-tech way to stop Israel from monitoring their movements.

One of the exploded pagers in Lebanon.

WHERE DID THE PAGERS COME FROM?

The pagers were ordered from Gold Apollo in Taiwan and had been tampered with before they reached Lebanon, US officials have told The New York Times.

Over 3000 pagers were distributed to members of Hezbollah across Lebanon, with some reaching Iran and Syria.

Israel’s simultaneous attack affected devices that had been switched on by the users and were receiving messages.

Security sources said the pagers were the company’s AP924 model, the latest model brought in by Hezbollah in recent months.

HOW DID ISRAEL EXPLODE PAGERS?

The New York Times quoted unnamed US officials who claimed the pagers received a message at 3.30pm Lebanon time that looked as if it was from Hezbollah’s leadership.

But the message, which was followed by beeping for several seconds, activated the explosives, the paper reported.

One Hezbollah official told the Wall Street Journal that some members felt their pagers heat up and disposed of them before they detonated.

One of the explosions, at a fruit market, was caught on video.

People gather outside a hospital in Beirut after the attack. Picture: AFP

A former British Army munitions expert told the BBC the pagers would have likely been packed with military-grade high explosive, hidden inside a fake electronic component.

A text message would then have triggered the explosive, the expert, who wished to remain anonymous, said.

Another theory, put forward by Errata Security, a cybersecurity company in Atlanta, is that hackers made the batteries inside the pagers blow up with a page containing malicious code.

HOW DID ISRAEL GET ACCESS TO PAGERS?

A security analyst has raised the prospect that the third party which sold the devices could have been an “intelligence front” set up by Israel for the purpose.

“For Israel to embed an explosive trigger within the new batch of pagers, they would have likely needed access to the supply chain of these devices,” Brussels-based military and security analyst Elijah Magnier told AFP.

“Israeli intelligence has infiltrated the production process, adding an explosive component and remote triggering mechanism into the pagers without raising suspicion,” he said.

Originally published as Hezbollah pagers explode: What we know about Israel’s attack