[RD] War in Gaza News: Pas de Deux

[Snowygerry]

New form of electronic warfare ?

Hezbollah members among hundreds wounded after pagers explode in Lebanon and Syria, officials say

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.

apnews.com

The news agency reported that in Beirut’s southern suburbs and other areas “the handheld pagers system was detonated using advanced technology, and dozens of injuries were reported.”

The Hezbollah official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media said the explosions were the result of “a security operation that targeted the devices.”

 

[Kaitzilla]

New form of electronic warfare ?

Hezbollah members among hundreds wounded after pagers explode in Lebanon and Syria, officials say

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.

apnews.com

I would imagine they snuck a tiny amount of strong explosives into each of the pagers.
James Bond shenanigans.

Over 1000 people have been injured, with some dead.
Pretty scary.


Imagine if everyone's pocket smartphones detonated?
Like an episode of Black Mirror.

**Edit**
Almost 3000 injured.
200+ in critical condition.
8 dead.

 

[Lexicus]

Pretty elaborate operation but par for the course for Mossad. As usual its strategy of trying to decapitate resistance groups by assassination is unlikely to succeed.

 

[Snowygerry]

I was just listening to an engineer, it seems possible to overheat a battery remotely unless some form safety is built into the battery itself, either the cheap pagers lack such a system or the Israelis found a way to circumvent it..

Radio reports over 3000 wounded and several dead, the explosions lasted over an hour..

 

[Kaitzilla]

*Sets smartphone on table and backs away*


Hello again personal computer!

 

[Joij21]

Now that everyone's in the hospital, Israel is positioning troops to missile strike the hospitals.

 

[Lexicus]

I just saw footage of one of these explosions and I'm leaning toward planted explosives. It looked nothing like videos I've seen of overheating batteries.

 

[Snowygerry]

One does not rule out the other, hide one explosion among thousands of others, destroy an enemy communication system, overload already stressed medical services and indeed create targets of opportunity.

Hezbollah fighter, son of Hezbollah MP, killed in pager detonation, first confirmed death - report

Hezbollah fighter, son of Hezbollah MP, killed in pager detonation in first reported death in blasts, two secu

m.jpost.com

According to reports, the phones were called before the explosion for some period of seconds to increase the chance that whoever received the call would pick it up and be maximally wounded.

Edit, reporters were working through the night to follow the trail, it first led to Taiwan, now to Hungary apparently :

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/gold-apollo-says-it-did-not-make-pagers-used-lebanon-explosion-2024-09-18/

"The product was not ours. It was only that it had our brand on it," Gold Apollo founder and president, Hsu Ching-kuang, told reporters at the company's offices in the northern Taiwanese city of New Taipei on Wednesday.

(...)
Gold Apollo authorised "BAC to use our brand trademark for product sales in specific regions, but the design and manufacturing of the products are entirely handled by BAC," the statement said.
Reuters calls and emails to BAC on Wednesday morning were not answered.
Hsu said earlier there had been problems with remittances from the firm.
"The remittance was very strange," he said, adding that payments had come through the Middle East. He did not elaborate further.

 

[Kyriakos]

^Those detonations of the pagers also injured civilians in cities in Lebanon and elsewhere. Basically it was a mafia-styled hit, with complete disregard of how many are harmed as long as Hezbollah members are harmed. The explosions happened in the middle of the day and many in central locations.

 

[Snowygerry]

Yes, they do not seem to distinguish between civilians and combatants in the ME, probably a feature of religious war anywhere...

 

[Kyriakos]

Lebanon is not at war with Israel. One wonders if it is a war-crime/crime against humanity to kill its civilians, non?
If you were walking in the street and Israel maimed you because without yourself knowing some person near you was in Hezbollah, is that that different from Pablo Escobar's methods?

 

[Snowygerry]

The Geneva convention means little there, there are war crimes at every turn...

They see things differently there.

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

The Geneva convention means little there, there are war crimes at every turn...

They see things differently there.

 

[Snowygerry]

Lebanon is not at war with Israel. One wonders if it is a war-crime/crime against humanity to kill its civilians, non?
If you were walking in the street and Israel maimed you because without yourself knowing some person near you was in Hezbollah, is that that different from Pablo Escobar's methods?

Rather compare with religious wars in Europe in the 16th century or so, Catholic vs. Protestant vs. Calvinist etc.

They did not care about civilians either...

 

[Kyriakos]

That doesn't compute, as the rest of the world is in the 21st century. Israel has the size of the Peloponnese, it's ridiculous to pretend that they are immune to being checked by (ultimately) the US.

 

[Snowygerry]

It's not just Israel, there was Syria, Iraq, and ofcourse endless wars in Lebanon itself in 70s and 80s.

When did anyone care for civilians...?

 

[Kyriakos]

If you don't care for civilians, then what exactly is the moral highground about? Or are you arguing that it's just pretense and we are all of the same bestial level?

 

[Gorbles]

It's not just Israel, there was Syria, Iraq, and ofcourse endless wars in Lebanon itself in 70s and 80s.

When did anyone care for civilians...?

Because the country in question (Israel) is frequently described as being "the only democracy in the Middle East", receives millions, if not billions, of dollars in aid, and claims "precision" strikes when tens, hundreds, thousands or more civilians are injured or killed.

Israel enjoys a far greater suite of benefits (and public image) compared to other countries in the region. This is an image that various Western countries propagate. If Israel are in fact not being moral (pretty inarguable at this point), or even like you're saying are behaving the same as everyone else, then the special standards that they benefit from should be revoked. No?

 

[Snowygerry]

Nonsense - it is just as frequently described as a "religious apartheid state".

Closer to the truth imho, but the war is hardly about my opinion is it ?

 

[Kyriakos]

If we accept such methods - exploding pagers - and normalize literally passer-by civilians losing limbs as ok for Great Israel, then it will be normalized for Great Other too, and not very long from now you'll see Eu citizens suffering the same fate. Will you still hold the same position then? Caedite eos etc?