A Lebanese police officer inspects a car damaged by an exploding pager in Beirut on Tuesday. Hundreds of pagers belonging to Hezbollah members exploded simultaneously. The group blamed Israel.
Hussein Malla/AP / AP
Electronic pagers belonging to members of the Lebanese group Hezbollah exploded simultaneously on Tuesday afternoon, killing at least nine people and wounding around 2,800 across the Middle East nation. The method of attack was highly unusual, if not unprecedented, and raised the specter of an escalation in the Israel-Hezbollah fighting.
Lebanese government officials and Hezbollah blamed Israel and predicted the militant group would mount a strong response. Israel's military declined to comment, though its security forces have a history of carrying out tech-related attacks, such as exploding cell phones.
"After examining all the facts, available data and information about the heinous attack that took place this afternoon, we hold the Israeli enemy fully responsible for this criminal aggression," Hezbollah said in a statement.
Many of the explosions rocked the southern suburbs of Beirut, the main Hezbollah stronghold. Videos on social media show a number of men going about daily business, when they are suddenly knocked to the ground by the force of the exploding pagers. Bystanders were also injured.
Ambulances rushed the wounded to hospitals, where they soon overwhelmed emergency rooms. While the largest number of casualties was in Beirut, there were also wounded in the north and the south of the country.
Health workers carry a man who was wounded after when a pager exploded in Lebanon's southern port city of Sidon.
STR/AP / AP
Hezbollah thought pagers would be more secure
There was no immediate word on how such an attack was planned and executed.
In one widely circulated but unverified video, a man appears to check his pager just before it goes off, suggesting the explosion may have been triggered by an incoming message.
Online, some speculated that the batteries could have been made to somehow overheat. But Trevor Ball, a former explosive ordnance disposal technician for the U.S. Army said he believes that explosives must have been planted in the pagers.
“Based off the videos and pictures of the pagers, it appears that the pagers had a small amount of high explosives that were remotely initiated,” Ball told NPR in a message. “The widespread nature of the pagers exploding indicates that the supply chain of the pagers was compromised at some point.”
Hezbollah members began carrying pagers after the heavy fighting erupted with Israel almost a year ago. Hezbollah knows that Israel's security services are often able to hack into phone networks, and the Lebanese group thought the pagers would provide a more secure way to communicate.
Reports from Lebanon said Hezbollah recently received a new batch of imported pagers, which were being used to share information about possible Israeli drone strikes and other attacks.
After the explosions, which took place around 3:30 p.m. Tuesday, the Ministry of Public Health told “all citizens who own wireless communication devices stay away from them.” Hezbollah told all its members who recently received new pagers to throw them away.
Lebanon's health minister, Firas Abiad, said Tuesday evening that at least 2,800 people were injured. Most had wounds to the face, hands and mid-section, he said. Various media reports in Lebanon put the death toll at nine.
At the State Department, spokesman Matt Miller said the U.S. was not aware of the attack in advance and was still gathering information.
One U.S. official, who was not authorized to speak publicly, told NPR that Israel informed the U.S. that it carried out the attack after it was over.
Hezbollah and Israel began trading cross-border rocket and missile fire almost immediately after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack last year on southern Israel. The level of fighting along the Lebanon-Israel border has picked up recently, raising the possibility of a full-scale war.
NPR's Geoff Brumfiel contributed to this report.
Copyright 2024 NPR