What just happened to Hezbollah?

Folks at Mossad HQ will be cracking open the arak after pulling off what appears to be the most brazen intelligence operation against Hezbollah in history.

Here’s what we ✌️know✌️

At around 3.30pm Tuesday local time (10.30am NYC time), thousands of Hezbollah members across Lebanon and Syria received an urgent message purportedly from top leaders. The message arrived via their old-school pagers, which don’t rely on cell networks so are seen as harder to penetrate, notwithstanding their 1990s medical drama vibes.

Those pagers beeped for a few seconds before exploding simultaneously, killing a dozen Hezbollah members and injuring thousands more. Lebanon’s health minister says hundreds of those are now in a critical condition, and various hospitals are overwhelmed.

Who else got hit?

• Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon has also been injured. Incidentally, it’s hard to think of clearer proof of Iran’s support for Hezbollah than an Iranian ambassador joining Hezbollah’s pager group chat.
• There are also reports the eight-year-old daughter of a Hezbollah lawmaker has died, while two sons of other Hezbollah lawmakers were reportedly wounded (the group’s political wing has a big presence in Lebanon’s legislature).

Who did it? 

Israel has a policy of not confirming this stuff, but… it was Israel. Specifically, it seems to have been a joint venture between its Mossad intelligence service and the Israeli military.

How’d Israel do it?

The most prominent and credible theory – backed up by leaks to outlets like The New York Times – suggests Israeli intelligence got word Hezbollah was trying to improve its comms security with these new-old pagers.

So Israeli operatives intercepted the Taiwan-branded and Hungarian-made devices at some point before delivery, inserted tiny explosives, issued the fake urgent message from Hezbollah leadership, then remotely detonated the pagers.

There’s also a theory that a doctored code emitted from a compromised radio network could’ve caused the devices’ lithium batteries to heat up and explode, though footage suggests this was bigger than just a lithium explosion. It’s possible the truth is a combination of the two theories (heating the battery to trigger the explosive).

So what does this mean?

For Hezbollah, this is another humiliation after months of regular Israeli assassinations of top Hezbollah and Hamas commanders. Hezbollah has now seemingly lost battle effectiveness for thousands of its combatants, not to mention credibility among its own members, backers, peers, recruits, and wider Lebanon.

The authority of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah himself will take a hit too, because it was his personal order for everyone to ditch their phones for pagers. And this in turn all hits Hezbollah’s manpower, morale, and effectiveness.

For Israel, it’s a coup:

• It’ll now be collecting a vast amount of intelligence via CCTV, media, hospitals, phones and beyond to map out Hezbollah’s presence, systems and responses
• It’s eroded the group’s ability (and even willingness) to communicate internally
• It’s stoked paranoia within other groups opposing Israel
• It’s restored some of the credibility Israel’s security services lost on October 7th, and
• This in turn all boosts Israel’s deterrence, which has long been key to its survival in a hostile neighbourhood: ie, mess with Israel, and this is what happens.

Given the above reports of civilian casualties, Israel is also facing accusations the operation was reckless or criminal, while Israel’s supporters say it’s one of the most precise counterterrorist operations in history.

So what next?

Hezbollah is vowing a “fair punishment”, while Israel’s military put out a statement overnight offering no comment on the exploding pagers, but confirming its generals are now “focusing on readiness in both offence and defence in all arenas“. It’s really a signal to both domestic and foreign audiences that Israel is ready for any retaliation.

And on the topic of retaliation, these pager attacks come just weeks after Israeli jets hit thousands of Hezbollah rocket launchers, and just hours after Israel announced its war goals now include returning 60,000 displaced Israeli citizens to their homes near the Lebanon border. So in retrospect, it all looks calibrated to defang and dissuade any Hezbollah retaliation today.

Speaking of which… there doesn’t appear to be any unusual military build-up on either side of the Israeli-Lebanon border right now.

INTRIGUE’S TAKE

Operationally, intelligence types are stunned Israel was able to pull off such a brazen and complex plan, seemingly incorporating cyber, human intelligence, and technical capabilities. But zooming out a little, what does it all mean strategically? We have a few initial thoughts:

• First, it suggests Israel has no intention of going back to the October 6th status quo with hostile groups along its border. Rather, it’s using its October 7th response to degrade those groups and secure its borders longer-term.
• Second, no amount of reputational damage, ICC arrest warrants, or ICJ injunctions seem likely to curb Israel’s determination under point one above.
• And third, this operation will bolster Benjamin Netanyahu’s grip on power in Israel, which in turn will only reinforce points one and two above.

If you wanted to zoom out even further, there’ll also be a debate around whether this all sets a dangerous new precedent in warfare.

Also worth noting:

• The US says it played no role and got no heads-up.
• Hezbollah is widely listed as a terrorist organisation, in whole or in part. The elimination of Israel has long been one of Hezbollah’s core goals.