Pagers used by hundreds of members of militant outfit Hezbollah exploded almost simultaneously in Lebanon and Syria, killing at least nine people — including an 8-year-old girl — and wounding thousands more.
The Iran-backed group blamed Israel for the deadly explosions, which targeted an extraordinary breadth of people and showed signs of being a long-planned operation. Investigators have not immediately said how the pagers were detonated. The Israeli military has declined to comment.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah previously warned the group’s members not to carry cellphones, saying they could be used by Israel to track the group’s movements. As a result, the organisation uses pagers to communicate.
Very small explosive devices may have been built into the pagers prior to their delivery to Hezbollah, and then all remotely triggered simultaneously, possibly with a radio signal.
By the time of the attack, the battery was probably half-explosive and half-actual battery.
A former British Army bomb disposal officer explained that an explosive device has five main components: A container, a battery, a triggering device, a detonator and an explosive charge.
“A pager has three of those already,” explained the ex-officer. “You would only need to add the detonator and the charge,” he said.
Between 3 to 5 grams of a highly explosive material were reportedly concealed or embedded in the circuitry.
Israel’s foreign intelligence agency, the Mossad, is the most obvious suspect to have the resources to carry out such an attack, say sources.
Israel had been accused of carrying out similar operations in the past. Last year, AP reported that Iran accused Israel of trying to sabotage its ballistic missile programme through faulty foreign parts that could explode, damaging or destroying the weapons before they could be used.
The sophistication of the attack suggests that the culprit has been collecting intelligence for a long time. An attack of this caliber requires building the relationships needed to gain physical access to the pagers before they were sold; developing the technology that would be embedded in the devices; and developing sources who can confirm that the targets were carrying the pagers.
Hezbollah issued a statement confirming at least two members were killed in the bombings. One of them was the son of a Hezbollah member in parliament, according to a Hezbollah official. The group later issued announcements that six other members were killed Tuesday, though it did not specify how.
“We hold the Israeli enemy fully responsible for this criminal aggression that also targeted civilians,” Hezbollah said, adding that Israel will “for sure get its just punishment.”
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