Mossad Chief Reveals Strategy Behind Lebanon Pager Attacks

Two deadly pager attacks that killed dozens and injured thousands in Lebanon in September last year wouldn’t have had the same effect if they’d been executed earlier in the war, Israel’s Mossad Chief David Barnea said in comments carried by Israeli media.

Credit : AFP

On September 17-18, 2024, at least 42 people were killed and nearly 4,000 were wounded, including many severely maimed, when their pager devices and walkie-talkies exploded. Most were members of Hezbollah.

Speaking at a conference in Tel Aviv, Barnea said there were 10 times as many beepers used by Hezbollah fighters in September compared to a year earlier.

Israel started planning the attack with the use of walkie-talkies but then decided in late 2022 to focus more on pagers after realising they had been attached to the bodies of Hezbollah fighters, Barnea said. The first batch of 500 pagers arrived in Lebanon a few weeks before the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack.

The spy chief also said Mossad had been preparing for war with Lebanon since the end of the previous conflict in 2006. “We collected intimate and unique intelligence over many years,” he said.

The pager attacks, followed by the killing of Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah a week later, marked the opening salvo of what turned into a two-month all-out war between Israel and Hamas that severely weakened the Lebanese group.