On 17 September, hundreds of handheld pagers simultaneously exploded across Lebanon, killing at least 12 people, including two children. Over three thousand men, women and children suffered injuries, including many in critical condition. The Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon was injured in this attack. According to the official Lebanese National News Agency, the pagers exploded simultaneously in the southern suburbs of Beirut, in various towns in southern Lebanon, as well as in eastern Lebanon. A second attack took place again on 18 September, involving exploding handheld walkie-talkie radios, which killed at least 14 people and injured another 450. Again, on 20 September, senior leaders of the Hezbollah were killed in an Israeli air attack on a suburb in Beirut, which killed 37 people including three children and seven women, and caused injuries to 66 others.
The Lebanese government has condemned these attacks as an act of war by Israel against Lebanon. Hezbollah has accused Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad of planting explosives inside the pagers.
The stated targets of the pager explosions were Hezbollah members who have been known to use pagers for internal communication. At the same time, it was carried out with the full knowledge that there would be massive civilian casualties. Lebanese hospitals are overwhelmed, and Lebanon’s health ministry is desperately trying to collect blood donations for the wounded. This is nothing but terrorism.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk told the Security Council that the attack on Hezbollah communications devices violated international law and could constitute a war crime.
Hezbollah Secretary-General Nasrallah has condemned the attacks as a “major terrorist operation, an act of genocide and massacre,” amounting to a “declaration of war.”
The aim of Israel’s deadly terrorist attack on Lebanon is to demoralise, weaken and destroy the Palestinian resistance forces, opposing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza since last October. It is intended to put pressure to thwart the negotiations that are being pursued at various levels, to bring about a ceasefire and an end to the Israeli aggression on Gaza.
Peoples and countries across the world are condemning this cyber-attack and the ongoing attacks on the Lebanese people as an act of outright terrorism by Israel against an entire nation and its people. It is a war crime and a violation of international law. Under international law, weaponizing an object meant for civilian use is strictly prohibited (Hague Convention Annexe 1907).
For almost one year now, Israel has been carrying out a genocidal war against the Palestinian people in Gaza and more recently in the West Bank. US imperialism and its Western imperialist allies have been brazenly funding the war and supplying arms to Israel. Israel is continuing the war in blatant violation of the orders of the International Court of Justice and repeated resolutions of the UN General Assembly, calling for a ceasefire. At least 41,391 Palestinians, most of them civilians, have been killed and 95,760 wounded, in Israel’s war on Gaza since last October, while hundreds of people continue to be killed and wounded daily, in the ongoing Israeli attacks.
The terrorist attacks on Lebanon signal the decision of Israel, with the full backing of the US, to expand the theatre of war.