My guess is that Israeli intelligence intercepted a communication in which Hezbollah indicated an intention to bulk purchase pagers (likely at a discount due to volume). Then it was just a matter of working up the supply chain to discover which entity consummated the purchase, who got the wholesale order, and which manufacturer contracted to fill the order. Very likely the explosive charge was pre-engineered as a benign appearing component in the device, which was then assembled without anyone in the plant knowing what it was or what it did. In such a scenario, Israel would have had accomplices monitoring these activities every step of the way.
However, what baffles me about this operation is that, if you can modify an electronic device inserted into the possession of your enemy, why not use it to perpetually keep tabs on location, movement, and intercepted phone numbers or texts (an intelligence gift that keeps on giving) rather than use it as a one-time wounding exercise and thereby lose all access to future data. The latter strikes me as desperate and shortsighted. And Israel has now incentivized Hezbollah to return the favor is some similar form or fashion. Dirty tricks can become a two-way street.
Along with however many victims this attack ultimately claims, Israel just killed its high tech sector, which accounted for 15.3% of GDP and 50% of exports in 2021.
Any electronic device made in Israel or under contract in a foreign nation friendly to Israel will be henceforth treated as if it were radioactive. Whatever portion of the Muslim world still buys from Israel will be looking for new suppliers now, and I would expect companies involved in the production of hand held devices will be doing likewise. Big boost for Huawei and other Chinese suppliers who will no doubt be the first to come up with a tamper proof casing for their products.
What isn't mentioned in the reporting on this attack is that many of the victims were health care workers.
>Today, however, Hezbollah’s health services—which include five hospitals and hundreds of medical centers, infirmaries, dental offices, and mental health providers—can barely meet the needs of wounded soldiers and their families, according to many local reports. Based on the average ratio of killed to wounded in modern combat, the group may have upwards of 9,000 such casualties to take care of.<
How many of these pagers were distributed to nurses and doctors? How many were used by others employed by Hezbollah in non-military roles, given the broad presence of Hezbollah in various public services? I guess we'll eventually find out.
This type of attack has no doubt been considered by other intelligence agencies who've then put the kibosh on it because of the potential unintended consequences which Israel will soon be facing. Israel seems intent on its own destruction and this attack proves the point. Whatever short term advantage it has gained, the blow back will cause more harm to Israel than to any of its enemies. At this point even North Korea looks sane by comparison.
Good points. Companies doing business with Israel in these or related fields will need to take a very hard look at potential legal liability. They've been put on notice that they're dealing with terrorists--Israeli companies are not in a position to say know to Israel's gov even if they wanted to, so who will pay damages for future terrorist ats? People who knowingly used terrorists in their products. Who would take the risk that Israel won't do it again?
Not so sure other than if they were able to insert a small amount of explosive into each unit without being detected, I'm sure they were able to modify the pager code to watch for an "activation code" and until then, run as normal. It is plausible to send the activation code from another device on the same frequency as the pager network (read airplane), but why wouldn't they just do a "page all" with the code by either hacking into the pager network or knowing the phone number of all pagers and sending the code that way? They were able to do something like that to Saddam's crew when they called all their phones at the same time right before we went in for Desert Storm and how many years ago was that?
What is disconcerting though is, what other devices are compromised??? We now know walkie-talkies, but what else??
Manufacturers buy batteries off third parties, all it would take is a purchasing manager to select an Israeli supplier.
We can only second guess the strength and depth of Iraeli intelligence and ingenuity.
We did the same thing not too long ago with the Stuxnet worm.
My guess is that Israeli intelligence intercepted a communication in which Hezbollah indicated an intention to bulk purchase pagers (likely at a discount due to volume). Then it was just a matter of working up the supply chain to discover which entity consummated the purchase, who got the wholesale order, and which manufacturer contracted to fill the order. Very likely the explosive charge was pre-engineered as a benign appearing component in the device, which was then assembled without anyone in the plant knowing what it was or what it did. In such a scenario, Israel would have had accomplices monitoring these activities every step of the way.
However, what baffles me about this operation is that, if you can modify an electronic device inserted into the possession of your enemy, why not use it to perpetually keep tabs on location, movement, and intercepted phone numbers or texts (an intelligence gift that keeps on giving) rather than use it as a one-time wounding exercise and thereby lose all access to future data. The latter strikes me as desperate and shortsighted. And Israel has now incentivized Hezbollah to return the favor is some similar form or fashion. Dirty tricks can become a two-way street.
Genocide is the goal.
Along with however many victims this attack ultimately claims, Israel just killed its high tech sector, which accounted for 15.3% of GDP and 50% of exports in 2021.
https://innovationisrael.org.il/en/report/part-a-israeli-high-tech-2022-situation-report/
Any electronic device made in Israel or under contract in a foreign nation friendly to Israel will be henceforth treated as if it were radioactive. Whatever portion of the Muslim world still buys from Israel will be looking for new suppliers now, and I would expect companies involved in the production of hand held devices will be doing likewise. Big boost for Huawei and other Chinese suppliers who will no doubt be the first to come up with a tamper proof casing for their products.
What isn't mentioned in the reporting on this attack is that many of the victims were health care workers.
from this 2018 article:
https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/why-does-hezbollah-want-lebanons-health-ministry
>Today, however, Hezbollah’s health services—which include five hospitals and hundreds of medical centers, infirmaries, dental offices, and mental health providers—can barely meet the needs of wounded soldiers and their families, according to many local reports. Based on the average ratio of killed to wounded in modern combat, the group may have upwards of 9,000 such casualties to take care of.<
How many of these pagers were distributed to nurses and doctors? How many were used by others employed by Hezbollah in non-military roles, given the broad presence of Hezbollah in various public services? I guess we'll eventually find out.
This type of attack has no doubt been considered by other intelligence agencies who've then put the kibosh on it because of the potential unintended consequences which Israel will soon be facing. Israel seems intent on its own destruction and this attack proves the point. Whatever short term advantage it has gained, the blow back will cause more harm to Israel than to any of its enemies. At this point even North Korea looks sane by comparison.
Good points. Companies doing business with Israel in these or related fields will need to take a very hard look at potential legal liability. They've been put on notice that they're dealing with terrorists--Israeli companies are not in a position to say know to Israel's gov even if they wanted to, so who will pay damages for future terrorist ats? People who knowingly used terrorists in their products. Who would take the risk that Israel won't do it again?
Not so sure other than if they were able to insert a small amount of explosive into each unit without being detected, I'm sure they were able to modify the pager code to watch for an "activation code" and until then, run as normal. It is plausible to send the activation code from another device on the same frequency as the pager network (read airplane), but why wouldn't they just do a "page all" with the code by either hacking into the pager network or knowing the phone number of all pagers and sending the code that way? They were able to do something like that to Saddam's crew when they called all their phones at the same time right before we went in for Desert Storm and how many years ago was that?
What is disconcerting though is, what other devices are compromised??? We now know walkie-talkies, but what else??
Hey, Nice new smartphone. Did you just get it???
I read that home solar devices in Lebanon were affected--exploded--on Wednesday, the 18th...after the walkie-talkies in the morning.
May be made in Israel and inserted in supply chain:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13868377/israel-did-not-tamper-hezbollah-pagers-built-scratch-lebanon.html
That would be quite a big operation and would require 3rd party cooperation to insert into supply chain.
Thousands of pagers were opened, armed one at a time, and closed.
Yes, quite a big operation.
Does a Faraday bag prevent the attack?
Probably would unless the devices blew up by an internal timer countdown, which doesn't seem to be the case.
Not surprising we assisted. The US military is basically the Israeli Foreign Legion.