The Israeli military and Mossad national intelligence agency have brought off a multi-faceted attack on Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon by intercepting the supply chain of their communication devices.
The operation was first initiated on 17 September 2024, when at around 15:45 local time pagers started exploding across Lebanon, killing 12 people, including two children, and putting thousands more in hospital.
As Hezbollah accused Israel of the attack and vowed retribution, a second wave of explosions then broke out in the late afternoon of 18 September, this time connected to the use of hand-held radios. At least 14 people were killed and more than 450 others injured in this secondary attack, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.
The Israeli government has not commented on the attacks.
It has been reported that both the pagers and the handheld radios were acquired by Hezbollah around five months ago.
From what remained of exploding pagers, their manufacturer was initially identified as Taiwanese company Gold Apollo, but the company’s founder said that pagers bearing its brand had been licence-produced by a Hungarian firm called BAC Consulting, with which Gold Apollo had signed an agreement a few years ago. BBC Verify has determined that BAC was first incorporated in 2022, with its registered address listed as a nondescript building in a Budapest suburb. BBC Verify’s attempts to contact the company went unanswered.
Given that Israeli operatives appear to have successfully penetrated the supply line of Hezbollah’s communication devices to rig them with explosives, it is plausible that BAC Consulting is, in fact, the front for the Mossad operation.
The pager and radio attacks, as well as killing and injuring many Hezbollah operatives, have significantly embarrassed the Lebanon-based militia, which had always prided itself on its secrecy. The pagers and radios, after all, were relied upon because mobile phones were considered too much of a security risk in terms of their calls being intercepted and located, but reliance on this alternative command-and-control (C2) network has apparently been exploited by the Israelis to target members of Hezbollah.
While the militia’s C2 network has now been significantly damaged, one unanswered question regarding the timing of the attacks is ‘Why did they happen when they did?’ Given that such attacks would have been most effective if used to blunt a Hezbollah offensive or throw the militia into disarray during an Israeli one, it appears plausible that the Israelis were forced into initiating the attack through circumstance.
One theory that more than one news outlet appears to have corroborated with security sources is that Israel’s operation was about to be exposed, leaving those in control of it to initiate the explosions to at least target Hezbollah operatives before the ability to target them could be negated.
Another theory, meanwhile, is that degrading Hezbollah’s capability in such a manner would prevent it from being able to conduct an offensive against Israel. However, given that there were already indications that Hezbollah was looking to avoid an all-out conflagration with Israel, the former theory seems more plausible.
It thus appears most likely the Mossad and the Israeli military have been forced to expend a vital capability before its use could have been substantially more effective.
