At the beginning of the year, a mysterious delivery of weaponized pagers arrived in Lebanon, part of a secret Israeli plan aimed at weakening Hezbollah. These pagers had batteries designed to conceal explosive devices, making them deceptively dangerous. According to sources in Lebanon who have closely studied the pagers, these batteries contained a hidden charge of a powerful explosive and a special detonator that couldn’t be detected by X-rays.
The creators of the pagers faced a significant challenge: how to explain the presence of these unusual and bulky batteries. To fool Hezbollah, they set up fake online stores and social media pages, crafting a believable story to cover their tracks.
The Ingenious Battery Design
Inside the battery pack, two lithium-ion cells were cleverly placed around a layer of a plastic explosive called pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), which weighed about six grams. In addition, there was a strip of highly flammable material that acted as a detonator. This setup was unusual because it didn’t use a standard metallic detonator, making it harder to detect.
When Hezbollah received these pagers, they checked them with security scanners but found nothing alarming. The pagers were designed to create a spark that would ignite the flammable material, triggering the explosive. As a result, they appeared to be normal devices.
Hezbollah later realized that the battery life was draining faster than expected, but this didn’t raise immediate suspicions. On September 17, a coordinated attack occurred, leading to multiple pagers exploding in southern Beirut and other strongholds. This incident resulted in numerous injuries and deaths, with reports of severe injuries among the victims.
Who’s Behind It?
Western intelligence sources indicated that the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad, played a key role in these attacks. However, the exact origin of the devices remains unclear, as Israeli officials have not confirmed their involvement.
After the attacks, Hezbollah leaders launched investigations to uncover how such a significant security lapse occurred. They had switched to using pagers earlier in the year after realizing their phone communications were being intercepted by Israeli forces.
The Deceptive Sales Strategy
To ensure Hezbollah chose their product, Israeli agents employed aggressive sales tactics, offering the pagers at lower prices until they secured the deal. This strategy, combined with the creation of a false identity for the pagers, helped them avoid detection during procurement.
Following the attacks, Hezbollah condemned the bombings as an infringement of Lebanon’s sovereignty. The group’s leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, described the bombings as potentially leading to a “declaration of war” and promised retaliation against Israel.
In the aftermath, tensions escalated as Israel launched a military campaign against Hezbollah, including airstrikes that targeted the group’s leadership. The investigations into the security breach within Hezbollah continued, but they suffered a setback when a key figure in the inquiry was killed by an Israeli airstrike shortly after the attacks.
This operation illustrates the intricate web of espionage and deception at play in the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, showcasing how technology can be used in warfare in unexpected and deadly ways.
