New wave of explosions in Lebanon as hand-held radios blow up across country

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A preliminary investigation has found hundreds of pagers that exploded across Lebanon had been booby-trapped, a security source said Wednesday.

"Data indicates the devices were pre-programmed to detonate and contained explosive materials planted next to the battery," the official told AFP, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "we will return residents of the north to their homes."

Tens of thousands of Israelis have been forced from their homes after nearly a year of cross-border fighting with Hezbollah. Likewise in southern Lebanon, over 100,000 have had to flee their towns and villages.

We plan ahead by stages, and at every stage the price paid by Hezbollah should be high: Israeli army chief

We have many capabilities we have not yet activated: Israeli army chief

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said Wednesday that the kingdom will not establish ties with Israel until a Palestinian state has been created.

"We renew the kingdom's rejection and strong condemnation of the crimes of the Israeli occupation authority against the Palestinian people," the prince, who is also the kingdom's de facto leader, told the opening session of its advisory Shura Council.

"The kingdom will not cease its tireless efforts to establish an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, and we affirm that the kingdom will not establish diplomatic relations with Israel without one," he added.

Senior Hamas official Izzat al-Rasheq said the Israeli government was responsible for the repercussions of "this continuous attack on Lebanon", after hand-held radios used by Hezbollah detonated across Lebanon's east and south and in Beirut's southern suburbs on Wednesday.

Germany has put a hold on new exports of weapons of war to Israel while it deals with legal challenges, according to a Reuters analysis of data and a source close to the Economy Ministry.

Last year, Germany approved arms exports to Israel worth 326.5 million euros ($363.5 million), including military equipment and war weapons, a 10-fold increase from 2022, according to data from the Economy Ministry, which approves export licences.

A source close to the ministry cited a senior government official as saying it had stopped work on approving export licences for arms to Israel pending a resolution of legal cases arguing that such exports from Germany breached humanitarian law.

The ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

Explosions were reported Wednesday in northern Iraq at a base belonging to the Iran-backed Popular Mobilisation Forces, known as al-Hashd al-Shaabi.

The New Arab could not immediately verify this.

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel’s focus has moved to the northern front, with Lebanon, as a "new phase" of the war is beginning.

"The center of gravity is moving north. We are diverting forces, resources, and energy toward the north," Gallant told Israeli Air Force personnel at the Ramat David Airbase, in remarks published by his office.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Israeli army's 98th Division was moved to northern Israel from Gaza.

The United Nations Security Council will meet on Friday over the pager blasts in Lebanon targeting Hezbollah, said Slovenia's U.N. Ambassador Samuel Zbogar, president of the 15-member council for September.

The meeting was requested by Algeria on behalf of Arab states, he said.

Earlier on Wednesday, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that the pager blasts targeting Hezbollah indicate "a serious risk of a dramatic escalation in Lebanon and everything must be done to avoid that escalation."

"Obviously the logic of making all these devices explode is to do it as a pre-emptive strike before a major military operation," he told reporters ahead of the annual gathering of world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly .

He also said that it was very important not to weaponize civilian objects.

Guterres "urges all concerned actors to exercise maximum restraint to avert any further escalation," his spokesman Stephane Dujarric later said in a statement.

UN member states formally demanded in a non-binding resolution Wednesday an end to the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories within 12 months.

The text, which Israel has warned would fuel violence, is based on an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice calling Israel's occupation since 1967 "unlawful."

There were 124 votes in favor, 14 against and a notable 43 abstentions.

The pager devices used in mass detonations in Lebanon were never in Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government said in a statement on Wednesday.

"Hungarian authorities have established that the company in question is a trading-intermediary company, which has no manufacturing or other site of operation in Hungary," government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs said on Facebook.

"It has one head of operations in Hungary on its listed address and the devices referenced have never been to Hungary."

Hungarian national security authorities would co-operate with all involved international partner services and partner organisations in further investigations, Kovacs said, adding the issue did not represent a national security risk to Hungary.

Nine people were killed and over 300 wounded Wednesday when walkie-talkies exploded across Lebanon, the health ministry said.

"The new wave of walkie-talkie explosions... killed nine people and wounded more than 300," the ministry said in a statement.

Lebanon's official news agency NNA reported that home solar energy systems exploded in several areas in and around Beirut after hundreds of walkie-talkies detonated.

Israel on Wednesday blew up thousands of hand-held radios used by Hezbollah members in Lebanon in a second wave of an intelligence operation that started a day earlier which saw the explosion of thousands of pager devices, two sources have told American websites Axios.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman: The kingdom won't stop working for establishing a Palestinian state.

Lebanon's health ministry says over 100 wounded by exploding electronic devices in multiple regions of country on Wednesday.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Wednesday that civilian objects should not be weaponized, in the wake of a deadly wave of explosions across Lebanon targeting pagers used by Hezbollah.

"I think it's very important that there is an effective control of civilian objects, not to weaponise civilian objects - that should be a rule that... governments should, be able to implement," Guterres said at a briefing at UN headquarters.

"As important as the event in itself, is the indication that this event confirms that there is a serious risk of a dramatic escalation in Lebanon - and everything must be done to avoid the escalation," Guterres said.

"What has happened is particularly serious, not only because of the number of victims that it caused, but because of the indications that exist that this was triggered, I would say, in advance of a normal way to trigger these things, because there was a risk of this being discovered."

The simultaneous explosion of hundreds of pagers used by Hezbollah members has massively hindered the group's communications and could undermine its operations against Israel in Lebanon's south, analysts said.

The wireless devices used by Hezbollah combatants, health workers and administrative staff exploded across Lebanon on Tuesday killing 12 people and wounding around 2,800, according to official figures.

The nationwide blasts marked the culmination of a series of escalating attacks on Hezbollah targets by Israel - including a July air strike that killed senior military commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut's southern suburbs.

The pager blasts, described by a source close to Hezbollah as a "major blow", came hours after Israel said it was broadening the aims of the Gaza war to include its fight against Hezbollah on its northern border.

Hezbollah blamed the attacks on Israel, which has neither confirmed nor denied involvement in Tuesday's explosions.

Three people were killed in Lebanon's Beqaa region in the east of the country in the latest device blasts, the state news agency reported on Wednesday.

Dozens of people were wounded by new explosions in Lebanon on Wednesday, security sources told Reuters.

UN High Commission for Human Rights: Appeals for calm after pager explosions in Syria and Lebanon.

Lebanon's top diplomat on Wednesday said the deadly explosion of hundreds of Hezbollah members' pagers could be an omen of a wider conflict in the Middle East.

According to Lebanon's National News Agency, Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib warned of the incident's gravity, "because it comes after Israeli threats to expand the focus of the war with Lebanon, which would plunge the region into a larger cycle of violence, and signal a wider war."

Communication devices that exploded across Lebanon on Wednesday are hand-held radios and are different to pagers that exploded on Tuesday, according to security sources and witnesses.

Explosions were heard in the southern suburbs of Beirut during the funeral procession of four Hezbollah members killed on Tuesday.

There were reports of explosions being heard elsewhere, including south Lebanon and the eastern Beqaa region where Hezbollah operates.

A spokesman for the Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said Wednesday that none of its advisors were killed in the pager attack in Lebanon and Syria a day earlier.

Lebanon's Hezbollah said on Wednesday it attacked Israeli artillery positions with rockets in the first cross-border attack since Tuesday's pager blasts.

Those responsible for a deadly wave of explosions across Lebanon targeting paging devices used by members of the Hezbollah militant group "must be held to account", the UN rights chief said Wednesday.

"Simultaneous targeting of thousands of individuals, whether civilians or members of armed groups, without knowledge as to who was in possession of the targeted devices, their location and their surroundings at the time of the attack, violates international human rights law and, to the extent applicable, international humanitarian law," Volker Turk said in a statement.

The head of the Israeli army's Northern Command said the military "is determined to change the security situation as soon as possible. The commanders and the forces are completely committed – at peak preparedness for any task they will be required to do."

A statement from the Israeli army, as reported by Haaretz, said forces of the 179th Brigade and the 769th Brigade completed two exercises, simulating scenarios involving "maneuvering in enemy territory and evacuating wounded from the battlefield under fire."

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Wednesday that Western backers of Israel should feel "shame" after paging devices belonging to Lebanon's Hezbollah exploded, in a deadly attack the Tehran-aligned group blamed on Israel.

"Western countries and the Americans... fully support the crimes, killings and indiscriminate assassinations of the Zionist regime", Pezeshkian said in a statement, referring to Israel, adding that the explosions should bring them "shame".

Finland's President Alexander Stubb defended his country's decision to buy arms from Israel despite the war in Gaza, saying it had no link to Finland's unwillingness to recognise an independent Palestinian state at the present time.

Finland is acquiring a ground based, high altitude, missile defence system called David's Sling from Israel. Helsinki considers the system a high priority for its own defence due to neighbouring Russia's ongoing missile attacks on civilian and military targets in Ukraine.

In an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, Stubb said the time was not right to recognise a Palestinian state, even though its Nordic neighbours, Sweden, Iceland, and most recently Norway, have done so.

"In the case of Israel and Palestine, values-based realism is prevalent in our thinking on the recognition of Palestine in the sense that we want that recognition, not if, but when it happens, to have an impact towards a two-state solution and a peaceful solution," he said.

Gaza's civil defence agency said on Wednesday that an Israeli airstrike on a school-turned-shelter killed five people, while the Israeli military claimed it targeted Hamas militants.

"Five martyrs and a number of wounded were recovered after the occupation targeted Ibn Al-Haytam School in the Shujaiya neighbourhood" of Gaza City, the agency said in a statement.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said from Cairo on Wednesday that he "can't speak to what impact Lebanon [pager] blasts will have on Hezbollah and its operations."

Among those wounded in Tuesday's pager blasts in was Iran's ambassador to Lebanon Mojtaba Amani, with Iranian media reporting he suffered injuries "to the hand and the face".

State television said Amani was only slightly injured. The Iranian embassy in Beirut took to social media site X to deny "rumours about the physical condition and vision problems" of the ambassador.

His treatment was progressing well, it said.

The Iranian Red Crescent said on Wednesday it had dispatched "rescue teams and eye surgeons" to Lebanon to treat the wounded.

"If necessary, we are ready to transfer the seriously injured... to Iran for treatment," the group's chief Pirhossein Kolivand said, according to the official IRNA news agency.

Any escalation, including Lebanon pager blasts, delays and puts hurdles against a Gaza ceasefire deal: Egyptian foreign ministry

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Egypt will not accept any changes to pre-October 7 rules for security on border with Gaza and operation of Rafah crossing from Palestinian side: Egyptian foreign ministry

US Secretary Antony Blinken on Wednesday denied reports that the United States had any prior knowledge of the deadly attack in Lebanon that saw thousands of Hezbollah members' pagers explode.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has conveyed his "sadness" over the Tuesday coordinated pager attack in Lebanon to Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati in a phone call, and says efforts to "stop Israel" will continue, according to Anadolu Agency.

Israel is pushing the whole Middle East to the brink of regional conflict by maintaining a dangerous escalation on several fronts, Jordan's foreign minister said on Wednesday.

In remarks after an Islamic and Arab ministerial contact group meeting in Amman to lobby for a Gaza ceasefire, Ayman Safadi said peace would not prevail without a two-state solution. Safadi has kept the foreign ministry portfolio in a new Jordanian cabinet named on Wednesday.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is scheduled to meet Thursday in Madrid with Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, in his first visit to the country since it formally recognised a Palestinian state in May.

Abbas is stopping in Madrid at Spain's invitation before heading to New York for the United Nations General Assembly, according to an official in his office.

Sanchez will meet with Abbas on Thursday, the Spanish premier's office said Wednesday, but the details of the programme for the rest of the Palestinian president's visit is not yet known.

Abbas is also due to be received by Spain's King Felipe VI according to the official in his office, but the royal palace, contacted by AFP, has not confirmed this meeting.

His visit comes after Spain, along with Ireland and Norway, on May 28 formally recognised a Palestinian state comprising the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi pledged to step up efforts to secure a ceasefire in the Gaza war during talks on Wednesday with visiting US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

During their meeting in Cairo, Sisi "exchanged views on ways to intensify joint efforts between Egypt, the US and Qatar to make progress on ceasefire negotiations and the exchange of hostages and detainees", said a statement issued by his office.

Lebanon's caretaker Health Minister Firas Abyad said Wednesday that 12 people were killed after paging devices used mainly by Hezbollah members exploded across Lebanon a day earlier, adding that some wounded were treated in Syria.

"After checking with all the hospitals", the toll was revised to "12 dead including two children", Abyad told a news conference, putting the number of wounded between 2,750 and 2,800 - including 300 in critical condition.

Some cases in the Lebanon's eastern Beqaa governorate "were transferred to Syria", while "other cases will be evacuated to Iran", he added.

Yemen's Houthi rebels shot down two American MQ-9 Reaper drones in under a week, the United States military acknowledged Wednesday.

The U.S. military said Houthis shot down the first Reaper on September 10, and the second on Monday. An online video showed the downing and the flaming wreckage on the ground afterward in Yemen's Dhamar province.

General Atomics Reapers, which cost around $30 million apiece, can fly at altitudes up to 50,000 feet (15,240 meters) and have an endurance of up to 24 hours before needing to land. The aircraft have been flown by both the U.S. military and the CIA over Yemen for years.

U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, the Pentagon's press secretary, said authorities continue to investigate Monday's downing, but declined to elaborate. He added that a claim by the Houthis that they shot down 10 Reapers since the start of their campaign in November over the Israel-Hamas war was "not accurate."

"For operation security reasons, I’m not going to be able to provide a specific number," Ryder said Tuesday.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi told U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken that Cairo rejects any attempts at escalation in the region and supports Lebanon following the pager blasts, the Egyptian presidency said on Wednesday.

At least 13 people were killed and nearly 4,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon on Tuesday.

"The President affirmed Egypt's rejection of attempts to escalate the conflict and expand its scope regionally, pointing out the need for all parties to act responsibly, and reaffirming Egypt's support for Lebanon", the statement added.

Israel's military offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed at least 41,272 Palestinians and wounded 95,551 since October 7, the Palestinian enclave's health ministry said on Wednesday.

The UN's Special Coordinator to Lebanon, JeanineHennis, has condemned Tuesday's pager attack across Lebanon.

🔴Statement:

The Special Coordinator for 🇱🇧, @JeanineHennis, deplores today’s attack across #Lebanon. She underlines the urgency of restoring calm & calls on all concerned actors to prioritize stability as paramount.

Full text: https://t.co/TfwvqkW6pw pic.twitter.com/BJ0aWHnGry

— UNSCOL (@UNSCOL) September 17, 2024

An Iraqi group called Neo Cyber said it was behind a cyberattack which hit several governmental websites in Israel Tuesday night.

Iran and Jordan have sent medical teams and equipment to assist Lebanon following Tuesday's pager explosions. 

The death toll from Tuesday's pager attack has reached 13, including three civilians and 10 Hezbollah personnel.

A young girl and boy were among those killed, plus a woman.

The Lebanese health ministry says hundreds remain in critical condition.

Hezbollah vowed on Wednesday to punish Israel after hundreds of paging devices used by the militant group's members exploded in a deadly wave across Lebanon.

"We hold the Israeli enemy fully responsible for this criminal aggression," the group said in a statement on Tuesday, adding that Israel "will certainly receive its just punishment for this sinful aggression".

Russia's Foreign Ministry on Wednesday said an attack on Lebanese group Hezbollah and others using exploding pagers was an act of hybrid war against Lebanon in which thousands of innocent people had been hurt.

Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, said in a statement:

"We regard what happened as yet another act of hybrid warfare against Lebanon, which has harmed thousands of innocent people.

"It appears that the organisers of this high-tech attack deliberately sought to foment a large-scale armed confrontation in order to provoke a major war in the Middle East."

A senior Lebanese security source and another source told Reuters that Israel's Mossad spy agency planted explosives inside 5,000 pagers imported by Lebanese group Hezbollah months before Tuesday's detonations.

Iraq has sent a shipment of emergency medical aid provided to Lebanon following Tuesday's pagers explosions which wounded thousands and killed around a dozen people.

Iran accused Israel on Wednesday of "mass murder" after paging devices belonging to Hezbollah exploded, killing at least 11 people and wounding nearly 4,000 others.

Foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said in a statement he "condemned the terrorist act of the Zionist regime... as an example of mass murder".

The United Nations General Assembly will on Wednesday adopt a Palestinian-drafted resolution that demands Israel end "its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory" within 12 months.

The action will isolate Israel days before world leaders travel to New York for their annual U.N. gathering. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is due to address the 193-member General Assembly on September 26, the same day as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

The draft resolution aims to welcome a July advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice that said Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories and settlements is illegal and should be withdrawn.

The advisory opinion - by the highest United Nations court also known as the World Court - said this should be done "as rapidly as possible," although the draft General Assembly resolution allows for a 12-month timeline.

Israel's Mossad spy agency planted explosives inside 5,000 pagers imported by Lebanese group Hezbollah months before Tuesday's detonations, a senior Lebanese security source and another source told Reuters.

The senior Lebanese security source said the group had ordered 5,000 beepers from Gold Apollo, which several sources say were brought into the country earlier this year.

Taiwanese company Gold Apollo said Wednesday that it authorized its brand on the pagers that exploded in Lebanon and Syria but that another company based in Budapest manufactured them.

The AR-924 pagers were manufactured by BAC Consulting KFT, based in Hungary’s capital, according to a statement released Wednesday by Gold Apollo.

“According to the cooperation agreement, we authorize BAC to use our brand trademark for product sales in designated regions, but the design and manufacturing of the products are solely the responsibility of BAC,” the statement read.

Gold Apollo chair Hsu Ching-kuang told journalists Wednesday that his company has had a licensing agreement with BAC for the past three years, but did not provide evidence of the contract.

Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah will speak on Thursday at 5 pm local time (2pm GMT pm) after Tuesday's pager detonations.

Lebanon's Hezbollah said Wednesday it "will continue, as in all the past days, its blessed operations to support Gaza", after a deadly wave of exploding pagers the Iran-backed militant group said Israel stood behind.

"This path is ongoing and separate from the difficult reckoning that the criminal enemy must await for its massacre on Tuesday," the group said in a statement issued on Telegram.

The Israeli military said on Wednesday that four soldiers were killed in fighting in southern Gaza the previous day.

A female paramedic was among those killed, the military said, adding that six soldiers were also wounded, three of them critically.

The latest fatalities bring the Israeli military's losses in Gaza to 348 since the start of its ground offensive in the Palestinian territory on October 27.