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.
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.
"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.
Israel is a state sponsor of terror and should be condemned as such.
They should be sanctioned.
Everyone targeted was a member of an internationally recognised terrorist organisation, and there was no reason for non-members to ever have the pagers. There are questions about rules of engagement, but one thing this operation wasn’t technically is terrorism.
These devices exploded in public places without regard for collateral damage to civilians. It is yet another war crime by Israel in addition to being an act of terror.
Also it's just not true that everyone was a member of Hezbollah. These devices are used by medical staff in hospitals. Israel has form in targeting doctors and hospitals.
New title: "How Isreal commit acts of terrorism"
You know the more that I think about it, the more I realize that if the CIA or NSA were tasked with eliminating Hezbollah using the same vulnerability, they probably would have set up the same shell company, but install a hardware wire backdoor into every device which would let them do insane espionage or setup widespread jamming or even fake intel, complelty remotely too.
They already have so many systems that do similar things, it wouldn't even be that difficult for them to pull off and cause Hezbollah to disintegrate by having them run around falling into easily laid traps.
But of course this is Israel, so they went with explosives to maximize that sweet civilian collateral like they're trying to top the bang for buck warcrime leaderboard.
This could only work on pagers sold over there. There's no need to panic guys! Much larger iPad devices are probably totally different and we should totally trust that no manufacturer would ever make any such thing happen in any other country. And this would also probably not be an issue to worry about in airports since those things don't actually fly. Right? ....ok sir, belt, Shoes in this bin, your completely disassembled laptops parts on these bins, and fake teeth on this Tupperware. Thanks!
Probably amongst the most impressive and precisely targeted strikes against a terror organization in history when taking the scale into consideration. Mossad is one of the most inventive intelligence agencies out there. They do not mess around.
If it is enough to dissuade Hezbollah escalating to an all out war in Lebanon, the few tragic collaterals pale in comparison to the number of prevented deaths.
It reminds me vaguely of Operation Trojan Shield, except with explosions.
I'm thinking a terrorist attack of this magnitude with the amount of collateral casualties it had will have international implications that reach far beyond convincing Hezbollah from escalating into a war, if it's actually going to achieve that at all. We're talking about a terrorist group, not an army. Personally i think this will probably just delay it and strengthen their resolve to actually go to war and be even more cruel. Terror groups thrive in terror conditions. The strongest military force on the world couldn't make a dent in terrorist groups operating in the middle east. Peace and stability, however, destroy terror groups.
I'm pretty sure everyone has realized that further atrocities are not the way out of this war. I just hope the belligerent parties can realize it faster and start coming to terms that they will have to share the land and make concessions. Until then i guess we'll keep seeing innocents die for motivations that make less sense each time, like Fatima Abdullah, who was just 9.
Peace and stability, however, destroy terror groups.
Which is precisely why Hamas escalated the Israeli-Palestine conflict last October. They were afraid that Israeli efforts towards fostering peace and cooperation with the other Arab countries were being successful.
Peace will be impossible to accomplish until the Middle-East at large accepts the existence of Israel, and Hamas have in turn proven that is impossible as long as militant islamist extremists with the primary goal of killing as many Israelis as possible (as opposed to securing safety, prosperity and freedom for Palestinians) rule in either of the two Palestinian territories.
Media Bias/Fact Check - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for Media Bias/Fact Check:
MBFC: Least Biased - Credibility: High - Factual Reporting: Very High - United States of America
Wikipedia about this sourceNew York Times - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for New York Times:
MBFC: Left-Center - Credibility: High - Factual Reporting: High - United States of America
Wikipedia about this source"Least biased" that is a joke. The NYT was literally regurgitating Israeli propaganda about October 7th rapes and constantly gaslights us about the genocide in Gaza, using the passive voice to mask Israeli crimes.