Thousands wounded, at least 8 dead in pager explosions across Lebanon in apparent Israeli attack

Thousands of people were injured in Lebanon on Tuesday by a series of explosions of personal communication devices across the country earlier in the day. Reports indicated that personal pagers, commonly used in Lebanon, began to explode simultaneously in Beirut and other towns and cities, especially in Hezbollah’s strongholds in southern Lebanon.

As of the time of writing, 2,700 people have been wounded and at least eight were killed in the explosions, according to the Lebanese Health Minister. The Lebanese Ministry of Health had earlier issued instructions to hospitals to prepare to receive large numbers of wounded.

Although Israel hasn’t yet claimed responsibility for the attack, Hezbollah held Israel responsible and vowed retribution for the “serious violation of [Lebanese] sovereignty,” Reuters reported.

Most media sources have attributed the explosions to an Israeli cyber attack, although the actual mechanism of detonation has not been established as of the time of writing. According to Al Jazeera, Hezbollah warned against the spread of rumors and speculation that contributes to “the enemy’s psychological warfare,” which aims to inflate the public’s perception of Israeli cyber and intelligence capabilities.

Other local Lebanese security analysts have asserted that the explosions were not the result of a cyber attack and that the nature of the explosions and reported injuries were not consistent with the detonation of lithium batteries commonly found in pagers. Other Lebanese analysts in local media sources have asserted that the explosions could have been the result of a “supply chain attack,” in which the pagers were rigged with explosives ahead of time and detonated remotely.

Jeremy Scahill of Drop Site News said on X that experts he spoke to believed the explosions may have resulted from tampering, “perhaps with small explosives.”

According to the Associated Press, a local Hezbollah official said the pagers had been newly acquired following orders that the group’s operatives stop using cell phones as a security measure against Israeli surveillance.

American whistleblower Edward Snowden said on X that the nature of the attack was “more likely than not” to be the result of “implanted explosives, not a hack.”

In another post, the former NSA contractor said that the Israeli attack was “indistinguishable from terrorism.”

According to local sources, dozens of Hezbollah members were reportedly wounded or injured, although pagers are widespread in Lebanon and used by health and emergency workers, as well as regular civilians. Video footage circulated online showing a pager device exploding while resting on the counter of a supermarket, while several customers and a cashier were present around it. Other footage showed an explosion taking place in a fruit market as several civilians were present nearby. The Lebanese Health Ministry instructed Lebanese civilians who own pagers to throw them away.

Hezbollah issued a statement saying that its security experts had opened an investigation into the attack.

The Israeli army announced that all Israeli forces were on high alert in the north in anticipation of a possible response from Hezbollah, Israel Hayom reported, while the Israeli public broadcaster reported that officials in the Israeli Ministry of Transportation were discussing the possibilities of a Hezbollah retaliation that affects the Port of Haifa and Ben Gurion Airport, as well as “other scenarios.”

The background: Netanyahu flirting with regional war

The series of explosions came a day after the Israeli cabinet passed a decision to make “returning Israelis to the north” as a war aim. The decision came in the midst of leaked arguments between Netanyahu and his war minister, Yoav Gallant, over the expansion of the war to the Lebanese front. On Monday, Israeli media outlets reported rumors of Netanyahu’s intention to dismiss Gallant from the government over his opposition to a large offensive against Lebanon and to replace him with far-right politician Gideon Sa’ar. Netanyhu’s office denied the rumors.

Also on Monday, the commander of the northern front in the Israeli army recommended to the government that Israel conduct an offensive aiming at creating a buffer zone within Lebanese territory. The Israeli threats were made as U.S. envoy Amos Hockstein arrived in Israel in an attempt to diffuse tensions between Israel and Hezbollah. Ahead of Hockstein’s arrival, Israel rejected a U.S. proposal for a definition of borders between Israel and Lebanon.

The latest escalation at the Lebanese front takes place almost a month after Hezbollah launched a drone and rocket attack that targeted the Israeli army’s military intelligence headquarters near Tel Aviv. Hezbollah said that the attack was in retaliation for Israel’s assassination of the group’s top military commander, Fouad Shukr, in late July in Beirut. The assassination put Lebanon and Israel at the brink of an all-out war, and sparked warnings of a regional war as Israel assassinated Hamas’s politburo chief, Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, the following day.

Hezbollah began a series of cross-border attacks on Israeli forces on October 8 last year, launching a “support front” to aid the resistance in Gaza. The attacks have grown in size and quality over the year, pushing around 100,000 Israelis to move away from the northern border as Israel intensified its strikes on southern Lebanese towns and its targeting of Hezbollah leaders and members. Despite U.S. attempts to end the fighting at the Lebanese border, especially through its envoy Amos Hockstein, Hezbollah has reaffirmed that it will only end its operations if Israel ends its war on Gaza.