Israel planted explosives in thousands of Hezbollah pagers, reports say

• Israel’s Mossad spy agency placed explosives in thousands of Hezbollah pagers before they detonated across Lebanon, multiple reports say

• A senior Lebanese security source tells Reuters the pagers were brought into the country months ago

• Separately, Israeli and US sources say Israel detonated the pagers earlier than planned, fearing that Hezbollah had become aware of the plan

• The pagers seemed to carry a Taiwanese brand – but Taiwanese firm Gold Apollo denies any involvement, saying the pagers were made by a Hungarian firm it signed a deal with

• At least nine people were killed and thousands injured when the pagers went off on Tuesday

• A munition expert tells the BBC the devices were likely packed with up to 20 grams of military-grade high explosive

Live Reporting

Edited by Owen Amos, Johanna Chisholm and Sophie Abdulla

1. A flurry of activity outside Beirut medical centrepublished at 21:51 British Summer Time 17 September

   We’re beginning to see more images from Lebanon’s capital Beirut, one of several locations where handheld pagers exploded on Tuesday.

   Here’s the scene outside one of the city’s hospitals:

   Image source, Reuters

   Image source, Reuters

   Image source, Reuters

2. Compromised comms system leaves Hezbollah vulnerable, analyst sayspublished at 21:35 British Summer Time 17 September

   Frances Mao
   Live reporter

   The damage done today to Hezbollah’s pager system leaves the group in a vulnerable position, Beirut-based analyst Nicholas Blanford tells me.

   He says until Hezbollah is able to “rebuild its comms system”, people may not be able to communicate with each other at times of need, and questions what that means for the group over the “coming hours and days”.

   But Blanford, a fellow at the US-based Atlantic Council, also points out that not all Hezbollah members will use pagers to communicate.

   “More senior field officers may not have been affected because they simply do not carry electronic communications devices, relying on messengers.”

3. White House repeats calls for diplomatic resolutionpublished at 21:21 British Summer Time 17 September

   Image source, Reuters

   Some fresh lines from the White House now.

   “We continue to believe that there should be a diplomatic resolution to this,” says press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.

   Her statement comes amid fears of escalation between Lebanon and Israel after pagers – used by Hezbollah – exploded across Lebanon and killed at least nine people and wounded nearly 3,000 more.

   Earlier, US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller also said the parties should find a diplomatic solution to the conflict.

4. Hamas blames Israel for attackspublished at 20:40 British Summer Time 17 September

   Hamas – like Hezbollah and some Lebanese officials – has now blamed Israel for these explosions across Lebanon.

   In a statement, the group says Israel has targeted both civilians and fighters in the move, and warned them of the consequences.

   The statement also references US support of Israel. The Israeli military has still not commented on the attack.

   Hezbollah is a known supporter of Hamas – currently at war with Israel in Gaza – and, like Hamas, is backed by Iran and proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the UK and other countries.

5. Lebanon in state of disbelief and shockpublished at 20:27 British Summer Time 17 September

   Carine Torbey
   Reporting from Beirut

   Image source, EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

   Hours after the mass attack, ambulances were still rushing to hospitals which were overwhelmed with the number of casualties.

   Outside, relatives of the injured were gathering in the hope of receiving any updates.

   The hospital where we went was closing its main gate and limiting the number of people getting in.

   “It’s very sensitive and some scenes are horrific,” one hospital staff member told me. He added that most injuries are on the level of the waist, the face, the eyes and the hands.

   I was told:

   Quote Message

   A lot of casualties have lost fingers, in some cases all of them.”

   Tonight, the whole country is in a state of disbelief and shock, with people unable to get their heads around what really happened.

   It is unprecedented in scale and nature and extremely hard to fathom even for a country used to unfathomable events.

6. 

   Videos posted online show injured taken to hospitalpublished at 20:12 British Summer Time 17 September

   By Richard Irvine-Brown

   Image source, Telegram

   Among the videos BBC Verify has been looking at this afternoon are several showing the aftermath of the explosions.

   Two videos show the scene of ambulances and crowds gathering at the entrance to the hospital in Tebnin, a town 75km (46 miles) south of Beirut.

   Meanwhile, in the capital Beirut, a video from inside Bahman Hospital shows the injured and dead in corridors and doorways, with doctors squeezing past to treat them and other medics calling for help, while more patients arrive on stretchers.

   In the two-minute tour through the hospital’s ground floor and western courtyard, we count at least 28 patients either being treated, carried in, or already bound with bandages.

   Another video, taken on Waked Street, 320m north of the hospital shows two injured men being helped by members of the public. One, bleeding heavily from his hand and possibly his head is helped toward a car, while another is lifted off the road by three men.

7. 

   Hezbollah considers this an escalation – what comes next is unclearpublished at 20:03 British Summer Time 17 September

   Daniel De Simone
   Reporting from Jerusalem

   Some in Israel have been arguing for the need of a military operation in southern Lebanon to create a buffer zone to tackle the threat from Hezbollah.

   Others have counselled against such a step given the potential impact of a bigger war. Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, has been regarded by many as better trained and equipped than Hamas.

   Yesterday, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin warned of the devastating consequences of further escalation.

   From Hezbollah’s statement today, the group considers an escalation has now taken place. What happens next is unclear.

8. 

   Attack comes after Israel’s previous warnings about its border with Lebanonpublished at 20:03 British Summer Time 17 September

   Daniel De Simone
   Reporting from Jerusalem

   The explosions today came only hours after Israel’s security cabinet made the safe return of residents to the north of the country an official war goal – the only one of four overall goals relating to the north.

   Israel has repeatedly warned it could launch a military operation to drive Hezbollah away from the border, and yesterday the Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant warned that, failing a political solution, “military action” would be the only option to ensure the return of Israeli citizens to the north.

   Since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October last year, and Israel’s continuing assault on Hamas in Gaza, there has also been a significant conflict with Hezbollah.

   The militia has been sending rockets and drones into Israel, with the Israeli air-force conducting frequent raids against the group’s positions and members. Thousands of cross-border attacks have taken place.

   The UN says the conflict has forced more than 90,000 people in Lebanon from their homes. In Israel, officials say 60,000 civilians have had to abandon where they live.

9. Were the pagers supplied?published at 19:52 British Summer Time 17 September

   Frances Mao
   Live reporter

   Based on the few details we know so far, several analysts are also suggesting the attack came about from weaponised pagers being supplied.

   Hezbollah has used pagers instead of mobile phones since earlier this year when the Israelis used them as tracking tools to find and kill commanders. They’ve been in use for a while now. But this could have resulted from a new batch being supplied.

   “This was a new shipment,” says Prof Janane El-Khoury from Lebanese University. “Who allowed this new shipment to come to Lebanon to be distributed to Hezbollah members?”

   Former CIA Middle East analyst Emily Harding also says it looks like a supply chain attack. “Perhaps Hezbollah did a refresh of their pagers, and the new ones were altered. Then the trigger must have been some kind of signal.”

   She said knowing where the victims were, and if the explosions happened all at the same time, would help paint a clearer picture.

10. Hezbollah member’s daughter among victims killedpublished at 19:45 British Summer Time 17 September

    Among the nine people killed is a girl, as we reported earlier.

    The girl is the daughter of a Hezbollah member and died in east Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley when his pager exploded, AFP news agency reports.

    Nearly 3,000 are injured, according to Lebanon’s health minister Firass Abiad.

11. US ‘not aware’ in advancepublished at 19:34 British Summer Time 17 September

    The US responds with apparent surprise to the pager explosions.

    State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller says: “The US was not involved in it, the US was not aware of this incident in advance and, at this point, we’re gathering information.”

    He adds that the US does not know who is responsible.

    Earlier reports indicate that both Hezbollah and Lebanese officials blame Israel, which has yet to comment.

    Miller also addresses the apparent injury of Iran’s ambassador in the explosion. “We would urge Iran not to take advantage of any incident to try to add further instability and to further increase tensions in the region,” he says.

12. What is Hezbollah?published at 19:20 British Summer Time 17 September

    Image source, EPA

    In short, it’s a politically-influential Shia Muslim organisation which controls the most powerful armed force in Lebanon.

    It was established in the early 1980s by the region’s most dominant Shia power, Iran, to oppose Israel. At the time, Israel’s forces had occupied southern Lebanon during the country’s civil war.

    Hezbollah has participated in national elections since 1992 and has become a major political presence.

    Its armed wing has carried out deadly attacks on Israeli and US forces in Lebanon. When Israeli troops withdrew from Lebanon in 2000, Hezbollah took credit for pushing them out.

    Since then, Hezbollah has maintained thousands of fighters and a huge missile arsenal in southern Lebanon. It continues to oppose Israel’s presence in disputed border areas.

    The group is designated a terrorist organisation by Western states, Israel and Gulf Arab countries.

    In 2006, a Hezbollah cross-border raid triggered a full-blown war between the group and Israel, with Israeli troops invading southern Lebanon – but Hezbollah survived the conflict.

13. Nine confirmed dead, Lebanese health minister tells BBCpublished at 19:07 British Summer Time 17 September

    Breaking

    Daniel De Simone
    Reporting from Jerusalem

    An update now on the number of people killed in Lebanon.

    Dr Firass Abiad, the country’s minister of public health, says nine have died and thousands more are injured after pagers being used by Hezbollah exploded in southern Beirut and several other areas of the country.

14. Fourteen wounded in neighbouring Syria – reportpublished at 19:02 British Summer Time 17 September

    We’re hearing that people in Syria, which borders Lebanon, have also been injured by the exploding pagers.

    “Fourteen people whose nationalities are unknown have been wounded in Damascus and its countryside after pagers used by Hezbollah exploded,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights – a UK-based monitoring group – says.

    The is in addition to the eight who’ve so far been announced dead and almost 3,000 injured in Lebanon.

    

15. Israeli military says ‘no change’ to defensive guidelines for civilianspublished at 18:44 British Summer Time 17 September

    We’ve just heard from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), who say in a statement they’ve held a situational assessment this evening.

    “At this time there is no change to the Home Front Command defensive guidelines,” says an IDF spokesperson. These are the directives issued by the Israeli military for civilians to follow in order to keep themselves safe in the event of an attack.

    “The public are asked to remain alert and vigilant, and any change in policy will be updated immediately,” the statement adds.

    The IDF are still yet to comment on the pager explosions.

    • As a reminder: Both Hezbollah and Lebanese officials have, in the past couple of hours, blamed Israel for the pager attacks.

16. Here’s what we know so farpublished at 18:29 British Summer Time 17 September

    Ben Hatton
    Live reporter

    Image source, EPA

    Pagers used by Hezbollah have exploded simultaneously, with almost 3,000 people reported to have been injured. The Iranian-backed Lebanese armed group, which is banned as a terrorist organisation in the UK, US and other countries, says an investigation into the cause is under way.

    Here’s what we know so far:

    Casualties:Hezbollah says two of its fighters and a young girl have been killed. The Lebanese health ministry say eight people have been killed and at least 2,750 injured. Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon – Mojtaba Amani – is reportedly among the injured.

    Hezbollah blames Israel: A statement from the group says Israel is “fully responsible for this criminal aggression that also targeted civilians”. It says “this treacherous and criminal enemy will certainly receive its just punishment”.

    Lebanese officials also blame Israel: That’s according to reports from local media in Lebanon. The country’s information minister Ziad Makary has condemned the pager blasts as “Israeli aggression” according to Lebanon’s Al-Manar TV broadcaster.

    Israel is yet to comment: We’ve not yet had a statement from the Israeli military, who have been engaged in cross-border fire with Hezbollah for months. The explosions come hours after Israel made the return of residents displaced by Hezbollah attacks one of its war goals.

17. 

    Shop CCTV appears to show pager explosionpublished at 18:16 British Summer Time 17 September

    By Richard Irvine-Brown

    Warning: This post contains distressing scenes

    We have been looking into dozens of videos from this afternoon.

    Some of those are difficult to verify, including this one inside a shop. It shows a small explosion which appears to injure a single person.

    While we are yet to establish where this was filmed, we have reverse-searched four frames from it and know Google had not cached a copy as of 16:30 BST today.

    This means it is very likely it was first uploaded in the early afternoon.

    The video appears to be CCTV and even has today’s date and a timestamp of 15:30 local time (13:30 BST), matching reports of when the explosions occurred.

18. ‘It’s extraordinary’ – analysts describe unprecedented attackpublished at 18:07 British Summer Time 17 September

    Frances Mao
    Live reporter

    I’ve been speaking to several Middle East security analysts who say the nature and scale of the attack on Hezbollah appears unprecedented.

    “It’s extraordinary. Hezbollah prides itself on its strict security measures, honed over decades of going head to head with Israel,” Emily Harding, a former senior CIA analyst who was also the Iran director at the National Security Council tells me.

    She and others say this is a critical breach of Hezbollah’s security.

    “A breach of this magnitude is not only physically harmful, but will also make them question their entire security apparatus,” says Harding, currently a deputy director at the US-based Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

    “I would expect to see them conduct an intensive internal investigation that will distract them from a potential fight with Israel.”

    Lina Khatib, from the UK-based Chatham House, says the attack “underlines how deeply Israel has infiltrated Hezbollah’s communications network”.

    “Many Hezbollah operatives switched to using pagers after mobile phones belonging to Hezbollah members were compromised by Israeli hacking.

    “The scale of the latest attack is deeply humiliating for Hezbollah, showing how vulnerable Hezbollah’s security is in the face of sophisticated Israeli military technology,” she adds.

19. Attacks on hardware are very rarepublished at 17:54 British Summer Time 17 September

    Joe Tidy
    Cyber correspondent

    Supply chain attacks are a growing concern in the cyber security world with many high-profile hacks recently caused by hackers gaining access to products whilst they are in development.

    But these attacks are normally contained to software.

    Hardware supply chain attacks are far rarer as they involve getting hands on to the device.

    If this was indeed a supply chain attack it would have involved a huge operation to open the pagers in a factory like setting and secretly tamper with them in some way.

    As security expert Dmitri Alperovitch said on X this would make the operation “perhaps one of the most extensive physical supply chain attacks in history”.

20. Devices might have been loaded with small amount of explosivepublished at 17:46 British Summer Time 17 September

    Frank Gardner
    Security correspondent

    The mass sabotage of such a large number of Lebanese pagers required both timely intelligence and technical capability.

    Since the start of the Gaza conflict last year, Hezbollah had warned its members not to use mobile phones for fear they could be tampered with by Israeli intelligence agents.

    Back in 1996, Israel’s Shin Bet agency assassinated a Hamas bombmaker with explosives in his phone.

    Instead, Hezbollah were using pagers to communicate, with a new batch delivered recently.

    Somebody – and Hezbollah are in no doubt that Israel was behind this – was able to secretly insert themselves into the supply chain for those pagers.

    A former British Army munitions expert, who asked not to be named, told the BBC the devices would have likely been packed with between 10 to 20 grams each of military-grade high explosive, hidden inside a fake electronic component.

    This, said the expert, would have been armed by a signal, something called an alphanumeric text message.

    Once armed, the next person to use the device would have triggered the explosive. Less than 1% of the exploding pagers have so far proved fatal, but with hundreds seriously injured this is a major psychological blow to Hezbollah.