Lebanon has experienced a new surge of unprecedented attacks since Tuesday, with a series of explosions across the country escalating regional tensions to a new peak. On Tuesday afternoon, hundreds of pagers belonging to Hezbollah members, including fighters and medics, detonated simultaneously, resulting in the deaths of 12 people, including two children, and injuring up to 2,800 others. As the nation grappled with this attack, hand-held radios owned by Hezbollah members exploded on Wednesday late afternoon in the country's south and the southern suburbs of Beirut. At least nine people have died in the latest attack, with over 300 reported injured.
Khaleej Times is closely monitoring this evolving situation to provide the latest updates. At 8.35pm, Israel has not issued any comment, despite announcing just hours before Tuesday's attacks that it was expanding the objectives of its war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip to include its fight against Hezbollah, Hamas's ally. The two have been engaged in near-daily cross-border exchanges since the conflict between Israel and Hamas erupted on October 7, 2023.
At 8.28pm, a senior Hamas official, Izzat al-Rasheq, stated that the Israeli government was responsible for the repercussions of "this continuous attack on Lebanon," following the detonation of hand-held radios used by Hezbollah across Lebanon's south and in Beirut suburbs on Wednesday. The UN Security Council is scheduled to meet on Friday to discuss the Lebanon pager blasts, according to the council president Slovenia.
Regarding the origin of the pagers, the Hungarian government stated on Wednesday that the devices used in the mass detonations in Lebanon were never in Hungary. Taiwanese pager firm Gold Apollo clarified that the model of pagers used in the attack against Hezbollah was made by Budapest-based BAC Consulting, noting it had only licensed its brand to the company and was not involved in the production of the devices. Hungarian authorities confirmed that the company in question is a trading intermediary with no manufacturing or operational site in Hungary.
Iran condemned the attacks in Lebanon involving exploding communications devices, according to government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani on the X social media platform on Wednesday. The Lebanon Health Ministry reported that at least nine people were killed and more than 300 injured in the second wave of device explosions. Additionally, home solar energy systems reportedly exploded in several areas of Beirut, as per the official news agency.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres emphasized the importance of not weaponizing civilian objects in light of the deadly wave of explosions targeting Hezbollah's pagers. The UN rights chief, Volker Turk, demanded accountability for those responsible for the blasts, describing them as "shocking" and their impact on civilians as "unacceptable." Hand-held radios used by Hezbollah detonated late on Wednesday afternoon across the country's south and in Beirut's southern suburbs, with three people killed in Lebanon's Bekaa region. AFP footage showed people fleeing as an explosion occurred during a Hezbollah militants' funeral in south Beirut.
