How Israel Built a Modern-Day Trojan Horse: Exploding Pagers
How Israel Built a Modern-Day Trojan Horse: Exploding Pagers
The Israeli government did not tamper with the Hezbollah devices that exploded, defense and intelligence officials say. It manufactured them as part of an elaborate ruse.
In Lebanon, as Israel picked off senior Hezbollah commandos with targeted assassinations, their leader came to a conclusion: If Israel was going high-tech, Hezbollah would go low. It was clear, a distressed Hezbollah chief, Hassan Nasrallah, said, that Israel was using cellphone networks to pinpoint the locations of his operatives.
. . .
Israeli intelligence officials saw an opportunity.
Even before Mr. Nasrallah decided to expand pager usage, Israel had put into motion a plan to establish a shell company that would pose as an international pager producer.
By all appearances, B.A.C. Consulting was a Hungary-based company that was under contract to produce the devices on behalf of a Taiwanese company, Gold Apollo. In fact, it was part of an Israeli front, according to three intelligence officers briefed on the operation. They said at least two other shell companies were created as well to mask the real identities of the people creating the pagers: Israeli intelligence officers.
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In Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, in the village of Saraain, one young girl, Fatima Abdullah, had just come home from her first day of fourth grade when she heard her father’s pager begin to beep, her aunt said. She picked up the device to bring it to him and was holding it when it exploded, killing her. Fatima was 9.
And
By the end of the day, at least a dozen people were dead and more than 2,700 were wounded, many of them maimed. And the following day, 20 more people were killed and hundreds wounded when walkie-talkies in Lebanon also began mysteriously exploding. Some of the dead and wounded were Hezbollah members, but others were not; four of the dead were children.
Both are war crimes, and while Israel hasn't formally declared war. Their defense minister is calling this a war.
But you can't use indiscriminate attacks, and you can't aim for maiming instead of killing.
Shit like this just makes more terrorists, which at this point is pretty obvious is Israels goal. They do t want to "win a war" they want to create a permanent boogey man so Israels current unpopular leaders get to hold.o to power a little longer.
Bibi and his people will keep doing this shit, because it's the only way they keep power.
They want war and chaos
Bibi and his people will keep doing this shit, because it’s the only way they keep power. They want war and chaos
I wish I could disagree, but, not possible.
which at this point is pretty obvious is Israels goal.
I think it's important to separate all of Israel, which includes ten million people with many different views, with the folks above. Not every Israelite, or even the majority of them, necessarily want this.
But you can’t use indiscriminate attacks,
Agreed. In the past I was willing to give some credibility to the IDF's claim that Hamas used their own urban population as hostages and that's why it was difficult for the IDF. But that line of reasoning doesn't apply with the pagers - those would have always hurt some civilians no matter how isolated Hezbollah kept from the general population.
and you can’t aim for maiming instead of killing.
Also agreed. Though given a choice between the two I'd be happy to be alive...
Both are war crimes, and while Israel hasn’t formally declared war. Their defense minister is calling this a war.
Wondering if this is worse - since it's not a formal declaration of war they've decided to ignore the rules of engagement and such?!
They want war and chaos
What's your view on Hezbollah launching rockets and mortars over the border?
Whataboutism.
Two groups can be bad at the same time.
They eliminated 2800 terrorists and only killed 20 civilians. That's the most successful attack on an entrenched gorilla force in the history of humanity.
Hezbollah and Hamas love to use civilians, children, and humanitarian aid as shields. Committing war crimes to stop the people committing war crimes is an odd argument.
This was a much more humane attack than firing RPGs from a hospital for example.
They eliminated 2800 terrorists
Israel said they're terrorists...
They also called American citizens who protest the American government providing arms for a genocide terrorists...
Would you be ok with them blowing up US college students for using the first amendment?
It's more like can we pick off those 2 or 3 people in that crowd of protesters that are about to do serious harm? If so...yea...do it.
But we don't know if they did...
IDF claims it only hit targets, which we know isn't true, and people standing next to them were blown up too
I just don't understand why anyone would just take the IDFs word, they lie constantly
Ideally you don't take their word, you send journalists and international investigators to the scene to verify.
What you definitely do not do however is take Hezbollah's word.
They kill journalists and investigators too.
The same journalists and international investigators that Israel has been blatantly murdering left and right?
Yes.
Ideally you don’t take their word, you send journalists and international investigators to the scene to verify.
Which has happened and they have shown that obviously if someone blows up while walking down the street, the explosion doesn't magically know not to injure anyone else
Leaked videos show people standing right next to them not getting hurt at all
Weird...you'd think you'd have a problem when the other side does it and takes out only non combatants in a crowd.
You know, I bet they have a problem with both! Shooting a rocket at a market is comparable to putting explosives on a possible combatant and detonating it while they are in a market. Let alone 3,000x that latter scenario.
Like I don't care for terroristic acts on civilians no matter where they come from. I'm unironically ok with them mass targeting the rocket sites, though!
There are videos of Hezbollahbros blowing up in a market and people standing right next to them not getting hurt at all. These are a lot different from say a Hezbollah rocket with a large warhead that can kill a dozen kids
Yeah, that's a fair point, honestly.
Because I'm up on the last century of terror in that area. It's just not compatible with western values...at all.
It's weird...all weird. Hezbollah wouldn't think twice of beheading a gay man in the middle of the street, but here on Lemmy they're like some bastion of freedom and justice.
This was a surgical strike against a very evil organization. It's about as humane as it gets when you're fighting an inhumane enemy.
This was a surgical strike
If you ignore all the evidence and just reality in general.
I can do the same and call a lump of lead a gold nugget, but I'm not going to have much luck selling it to anyone in touch with reality.
Kill one save a thousand
/s
"love to use civilians as shields" is the most "I believe shooting civilians to kill combatants is justified" ass shit ever written. Every time one of you civvy killing sons of bitches say that, I hope you flash into a universe where your family is killed and you are personally blamed for it. Experience your own violence.
Am I the only one here that can still remember all the way back to October? WTF?
How about the 80 years before October. You wanna talk about the past?
How far back you wanna go? They were a classy bunch as the ottoman empire as well.
"as the Ottoman empire" lol racist doesn't know the difference between a turk and a palastinian. No argument needed buddy, you already self reported
You might want to read up on what the Ottoman Empire was
Like when gunships mowed down their own civilians?
Lol...holy fuck...really? You believe that?
You don't/didn't see those videos?
Use of the Hannibal Directive was self-admitted
The Gaza Ghetto Uprising see 21:51