Israel Planted Explosives in 5,000 Hezbollah Pagers, Sources Claim

Israel spy agency reportedly planted explosives inside 5,000 pagers imported by Hezbollah, leading to deadly explosions across Lebanon. The blasts on Tuesday killed nine people and injured nearly 3,000 others, including Hezbollah fighters and Iran’s envoy to Beirut, according to sources who spoke to Reuters.

The pagers were said to come from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo, but the company denied making them. Instead, they said the devices were made by a company called BAC, which has a license to use Gold Apollo’s brand.

Hezbollah, backed by Iran, has promised to retaliate against Israel, whose military has not commented on the incident. In a statement on Wednesday, Hezbollah said it would continue its operations to support Gaza and its people, while also warning Israel of severe punishment for the explosions.

The plot seems to have been planned for months. Sources said Hezbollah ordered 5,000 pagers from Gold Apollo earlier this year. Gold Apollo’s founder, Hsu Ching-Kuang, confirmed that the pagers were made by a European company licensed to use their brand, but he did not name the company. Later, the company identified BAC as the manufacturer but did not give more details.

“The Mossad injected a board inside of the device that has explosive material that receives a code. It’s very hard to detect it through any means. Even with any device or scanner,” the source said.

“The product was not ours. It just had our brand on it,” Hsu said at the company’s offices in New Taipei, Taiwan, on Wednesday.

The source said 3,000 of the pagers exploded when a coded message was sent to them, simultaneously activating the explosives.

The pagers were identified as the AP924 model, which can receive and display text messages but cannot make phone calls. Gold Apollo confirmed that the AR-924 model was produced and sold by BAC.