Pager Attack: A Tactical Move Against Adversaries

The mass explosion of pagers in Lebanon which has rare parallels in the real world seemed to be an episode of a sci-fi fiction. But unlike onscreen picturisation, the casualties included 12 dead and over 2800 injured. Even before the cadres of Hezbollah could ascertain the magnitude of the attack, a second round of explosions erupted on Wednesday. Walkie-talkies and solar devices exploded in the second wave of the attacks killing 20 people and injuring more than 450.  With this, the restive Middle East region known for unconventional warfare has entered into unimaginable realms after the innocuous low-grade electronic devices turned into promising lethal weapons of retaliation.

The series of explosions have thrown the Iran-backed Hezbollah cadres into disarray. Hezbollah junked mobiles over fears of Israeli surveillance and resorted to pager usage as reliable communication lines. Incidentally, Hezbollah bought both the hand-held walkies and pagers around the same time, five months ago. Pagers bore the logo of Taiwan-based Gold Apollo, the Walkie-talkies are believed to have been manufactured by a Japanese telecom company ICOM. The Taiwanese pager company quickly distanced itself from the pagers stating that it had authorised a Hungary-based company BAC to manufacture them.

Roiling in confusion and anger, Hezbollah is now facing the worst scenario of the explosion of all kinds of electronic devices including radios and home solar systems. The affected now include the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) stationed in Syria as well. Besides leaving a trail of damage, the explosions mapped the extent and spread of the Hezbollah cadres across the region. They exposed the undeniable strategic entrenchment of Iranian proxies across the region. The case in point is the grievous injuries suffered by the Iranian ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani who carried a pager that exploded.

To evade surveillance, Hezbollah junked sophisticated communication systems. Israel outsmarted them by beating them at their own game with precision attacks. Unfortunately, there has been a huge collateral damage as the victims in some cases were innocent children and family members of the victims.

The multistage attacks have astonished the world. Reportedly, Israel hinted to Washington of a huge operation in Lebanon but stopped short of sharing any details. Even the US was taken by surprise.

Israel as of now hasn’t claimed responsibility for these attacks which has forced the global militaries to rethink their threat evaluation exercises. Along with perceived security risks from Outer Space, Cyberwarfare and AI, the innovative and ingenuous weaponising of basic devices has prompted analysts to press a reset.

Israel’s use of a panoply of techniques to neutralise adversaries ranging from AI to booby-trapped pagers and handheld walkie-talkies has now put security agencies across the world and especially in the region on the edge. Turkey is now reviewing the security measures for military communication devices. Qatar Airlines and MENA Airlines have issued a fresh directive banning passengers from carrying pagers and Walkie-talkies on board.

In 2020 Israel assassinated Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh with an AI-operated robot controlled remotely through satellite. With no operatives on the ground, Israel after monitoring his activities for over 14 years executed a masterplan without leaving any traces. Given Israel’s prowess in intelligence gathering and surveillance, Hezbollah dumped cell phones. It now emerges that Israel propped up a shell company that managed to get Hezbollah’s pagers contract and custom-built them with PTEN explosive-laden batteries. Israel pulled off the trigger by sending a message in Arabic on the pager and triggered the mass explosions.

This clean, meticulous and innovative operation besides stunning the world has sowed chaos, fear and insecurity among the Hezbollah cadres. Flawlessly carrying out a major anti-terrorist operation, Israel has rewritten the rules of psychological warfare. Though the success of the operation in terms of inflicting losses pales in comparison to conventional military warfare, the panic, stress and shock generated by the operation is an assault on the self-confidence of the ideologically motivated jihadi cadres.

From childhood, the idea of martyrdom as the highest honour in life has been deeply ingrained in these cadres. These battle-ready cadres highly resilient towards physical attacks are psychologically demoralised with the pager attacks. While these salutary attacks will temporarily slow down Hezbollah they can’t deter them from exacting revenge.

Instructively so, in response to the pager attacks, Hezbollah struck at the Israeli military base Metula with Falaq rockets. Though there was no loss of life, the fire from rocket attacks damaged several houses. Amping up these tactical gains, Israel has reportedly carried out 52 airstrikes in South Lebanon destroying 100 Hezbollah launchers.

Post-attacks Hezbollah Chief Nasrallah in a televised address said, “The enemy crossed all rules, laws and redlines. It didn’t care about anything at all, not morally, not humanely, not legally”. He added, “This is a massacre, a major aggression against Lebanon, its people, its resistance, its sovereignty and its security, it can be called war crimes or a declaration of war - whatever you choose to name it, it is deserving and fits the description. This was the enemy’s intention”¹. The recent turn of events is set to intensify regional conflagration.

Earlier in the week, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said, “The possibility for an agreement is running out as Hezbollah continues to tie itself to Hamas, and refuses to end the conflict. Therefore, the only way left to ensure the return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes will be via military action”². Soon Prime Minister Netanyahu after the cabinet meeting announced that Israel would expand war goals to include the return of Northern residents evacuated from their homes.

Since October 8, 2023, in solidarity with Hamas, Hezbollah launched attacks on Israel and vowed to continue until the Gaza ceasefire. These attacks have forced 60,000 citizens in the Northern territories to flee from their homes. However, avoiding direct military confrontation, Israel carried out the pager attacks as a warning of sorts against the potential consequences full-blown military attack.

Having hit a point of no return and grappling with the way forward in Gaza as if to rejuvenate its forces, Israel has suddenly shifted gears. Indeed, after the pager attacks, Gallant remarked, "The 'centre of gravity' is moving north, meaning that we are allocating forces, resources and energy for the northern arena". These unprecedented attacks have been a massive turnaround for Israel wrestling with a turbulent domestic front amid rumours of Netanyahu planning to replace Gallant.

Condemning the attacks, Iran's envoy in a letter to the UN said it, “reserved its rights under international law to take required measures deemed necessary to respond”³. Considering Iran’s strategic evasion after Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh’s assassination in Tehran, even now, it might be pussyfooted. But Hezbollah vowed retaliation for the two waves of attacks.

Militaries across the world especially those in the region are rattled. They are now forced to sit up to assess the next moves of the arch-rivals; Israel and Hezbollah.

Israel’s so-called ‘knockout punch’ has stoked fresh fears among nations over the prospective weaponisation of global electronic supply chains. Wary of Israel’s new model for mass precision attacks, countries will be motivated to impose fresh restrictions on the transfer of sensitive technology. Indeed, this can compel countries to aggressively indigenise to thwart potential security threats.

Surrounded by adversaries India has to seriously rethink and recalibrate its acquisition procedures. India must now institute stringent screening checks since most of its hardware and electronics are sourced from China, its primary adversary.

With these attacks, Israel emerged on top reiterating its superiority in pulling off meticulously planned, atypical operations and its intellectual superiority in countering the terrorist attacks. While this anti-terrorist operation has salvaged its lost pride and sheen of dogged grittiness, it has turned the region into a revengeful retaliatory cauldron.

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