Lebanese prime minister says the blowing up of electronic devices is a mass crime as Israel moves tanks and troops from Gaza to the north
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati has said his nation is at war after electronic devices exploded across the country for two days in a row, killing more than 30 people and injuring thousands of others.
On Tuesday, pagers used by members of the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah detonated simultaneously, killing 12 people and wounding nearly 3,000, according to the health authorities. Another 20 people lost their lives and 450 others were injured the following day when thousands of other electronic devices, including walkie-talkies, laptops, and radios, blew up.
Hezbollah and the government in Beirut have blamed Israel for the attacks. The Jewish state has neither confirmed nor denied responsibility. Media reports have claimed that the Israeli secret service, Mossad, rigged thousands of electronic devices with small explosive charges, which were triggered via a remote signal.
Yoav Gallant visits an airbase near the city of Haifa, Israel, September 18, 2024 © Getty Images / Ariel Hermoni
Mikati was visiting a hospital where victims of the first wave of explosions were being treated when reports of more detonations came in on Wednesday, according to the prime minister’s office.
“This mass crime… against defenseless people in their homes, who are being killed in this way, is indescribable,” Mikati told journalists. He insisted that Lebanon is in a state of war with Israel. “This war started about 11 months ago and it is affecting our people in the south where their homes are being destroyed,” he said.
Mikati was referring to regular exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and the Israeli military on the border, as well as the Jewish state’s airstrikes into Lebanese territory which started after the incursion into Israel by the Palestinian armed group Hamas on October 7 last year.
The prime minister again blamed Israel for the explosions of electronic devices, claiming that the Jewish state’s “whole history over the past 75 years has been criminal.”
IDF 98th Division patch
“We are facing an enemy that disregards all international and humanitarian laws, and the question is – can this continue? Where is the UN, whose primary mission is to distribute peace?” Mikati asked.
He added that he had instructed Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib to ensure that the attacks on the country are addressed by the UN Security Council.
Following the second wave of electronic blasts on Wednesday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that “a new phase” of the country’s almost year-long war was beginning, with the focus shifting from Hamas in Gaza to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Troops secure the area for an ambulance to enter a hospital amid a wave of explosions of electric devices across Lebanon. © Getty Images / Marwan Naamani
“The center of gravity is moving north. We are diverting forces, resources, and energy toward the north,” Gallant told Israeli troops. The elite 98th Paratroopers Division was redeployed from Gaza to northern Israel earlier in the day.
Hezbollah has waged a low-intensity military campaign against Israel since the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) began bombing Gaza almost a year ago. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has said that his goal is to tie up Israeli forces near the Israel-Lebanon border in order to prevent their deployment to Gaza, but Israeli officials – including Gallant – have threatened on multiple occasions to launch a major offensive into Lebanon in response.
Less than two months ago, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz announced that the Jewish state was preparing for “all out war” with Hezbollah, adding that he would “not go into detail” about the “disproportionate” strike that would open such a war.
The strike apparently came on Tuesday. When devices began exploding.
Source X/RT/AP