A whole nation is caught in fear and chaos as explosions rock the country one after the other. The fatal explosions started with pager bombs on Tuesday but went on to break loose into walkie-talkies on Wednesday and have already killed 14 people, with 450 and above others that have been wounded. Most areas of Beirut were affected, further increasing insecurity throughout the country.
One of the most dramatic incidents occurred in the funeral of Hezbollah MP Ali Ammar’s son, himself killed in a pager explosion on September 17. Walkie-talkies—the latest devices to explode—were the means of communication Hezbollah fighters have been using. These walkie-talkies had recently been taken over by the Iranian-backed Hezbollah, and on Wednesday, along with the explosions of these walkie-talkies, explosions of solar panels installed in homes across Lebanon also started erupting, adding to the chaos.
This is the second severe technical attack on Lebanon since tensions in the Middle East have risen to unprecedented levels. Recently, a Reuters, a British news agency, report alleged that Israel’s intelligence agency, Mossad, had reportedly wired 5,000 pagers carrying used by Hezbollah fighters, and the operation triggered widespread blasts in Lebanon, Syria, and other territories allied with Hezbollah.
Hezbollah responded with 20 rockets, fired at Israel’s Kirya Shmona on Wednesday. The IDF said that many rockets were intercepted; however, no casualties occurred on the side of Israelis. Hezbollah admitted to carrying out the rocket attack since it specifically targeted the Israeli military.
This is while Hezbollah threatens retaliation for the first pager blasts. Israel has already upped the guards by standing 20,000 troops on its borders with Lebanon. The two militant groups have been on each other’s case since last October 7 when Hamas went to town and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah cautions his fighters to stop using mobile phones as Israeli surveillance goes up a notch. Thus Hezbollah had relied on pagers for communicating but presumably perceived it as the best way of ensuring them away from Israeli intelligence. Events of last week would however point out that Israel has once again discovered ways of staying ahead of its adversary in how it turns those very same pagers into killing traps.
Meanwhile, a sea wave of destruction born from banning Lebanon’s government into banning pagers absolutely was induced. The global community watched in awe at the sophistication of such attacks. This scale and precision of the electronic warfare left many people in utter shock, as some labeled it one of the most dangerous and technologically advanced operations of the century.
Another victim of this new violence wave is the Iranian Ambassador in Lebanon, Mustafa Amani, who sustained a serious injury to his eye by one of the blasts. According to reports, his eyesight has been badly damaged. With Hezbollah and the Lebanese government accusing Israel directly of carrying out these attacks, the world waits to see if this new wave will ignite fresh rounds of violence in an already unstable Middle East.
This electronic warfare, utilizing what would seem like innocuous instruments, such as pagers and walkie-talkies, brings about a totally new and horrifying dimension to war, sending Lebanon and the wider region into shock.
Leave a Reply