GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War – Day 350

Hezbollah Is Hurting

Leadership Decimated

According to an article from the Jewish News Syndicate the entire Hezbollah senior command ranks was severely smashed:

As the dust settles from the mass pager and radio communication blasts that rocked Hezbollah in Lebanon on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively, and caused thousands of injuries and dozens of deaths in the ranks of the Iran-backed terror army, observers have begun to assess the damage incurred by the Islamist group.

The terrorist leader all but admitted they were hit hard in their leadership:

In a televised speech on Thursday, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah acknowledged that his organization absorbed an unprecedented blow to its personnel and security, adding that there was no dispute that “the enemy has technological superiority.” Nasrallah and other Hezbollah leaders have vowed retaliation.

It was a two-fer as the explosions took out leaders and their ability to communicate and then to function:

The historic attack has severely disrupted Hezbollah’s operational infrastructure by taking thousands of commanders off the battlefield due to injuries, hundreds of them severe, while eliminating much of its ability to communicate with field operatives, since pagers were meant to be a safer replacement for smart phones, which the group considers too vulnerable (for) espionage.

As such, the damage to Hezbollah’s command structure, communications infrastructure and morale is considered significant, damaging the organization’s ability to function confidently.

The numbers are astounding:

According to Cmdr. (res.) Eyal Pinko, a researcher at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University and a former Israeli Navy officer, who also served in an intelligence organization, the attack struck up to 3,000 terror operatives in “less than a second.”

He elaborated

“If you just look at the persons who were carrying those beepers, this is probably the senior commanders and above. So it’s from the battalion commanders and above. So probably what is happening now in Hezbollah is that all the commanding structure from, let’s say, the rank of lieutenant colonel in a regular military to the generals, the two or three generals, are totally injured or some of them (have) are already died. So now to get even to the time to reset and to start to understand what is happening, it will take a few days.”

They still have troops though, even if their leaders are in disarray:

The surprise attack left Hezbollah on its knees, he added, though the organization’s opposition in Lebanon still does not stand a chance against the Islamist group’s armed operatives, estimated to number almost 100,000 (including reserve forces).

“You need to have a huge army in order to, to compete with them,” said Pinko. However, the 3,000 or so injured operatives mean that an enormously significant number of senior commanders are not functional—in all likelihood, “all [of the] senior commanding level were damaged,” he assessed.

And the IDF took out a top commander, Ibrahim Aqil who was planning an invasion of Galilee (see this article for more on that).

IDF Has Been Active

Along with this very devious attack, the IDF continues to pound Hezbollah and even the site that built their missiles accuracy ability:

And on Sept. 9, international media reports said Israeli special forces and aircraft struck an IRGC missile site in Hama, western Syria, which was designed to produce accurate missiles for Hezbollah. That attack, said Pinko, harmed the group’s ability to get hold of “kits that make their bombs more accurate—the rocket accuracy program. So all these moves kind of look like softening up the target before actually striking,” he said.

And lest we forget, in July their second in command was assassinated:

On July 31, the Israeli Air Force killed Hezbollah’s second in command, Fuad Shukr, considered to be the organization’s “military” chief of staff, landing another blow.

The IDF’s intel has been incredible:

Pinko said that strike and others like it showcased “very precise, very accurate, very good intelligence, amazing intelligence.”

But how did the IDF even pull off the device explosions? There are so many theories:

Meanwhile, as international media reports focus on the pager attack, less attention has been given to how the explosive material in them was activated.

One person thinks it was malicious codes inserted in them before Hezbollah even got them:

Barak Gonen, senior lecturer at the Jerusalem College of Technology and a former cybersecurity official in the Israel Defense Forces, told JNS that in theory, “Getting a remote device to run a malicious code requires uploading the code into the device before execution, which is an immense task if done remotely.”

Attacking remotely is possible, but there are signs that Israel actually treated them before they were bought:

He added, “I would assume that all modern intelligence agencies employ experts that master the skills of attacking remote devices. However, in this event, as the details unfold it becomes more apparent that the devices were ‘treated’ before handling them to Hezbollah. As an attacker, holding the device in your hand makes it far easier to attack, as you can alter the code that is running in the device. What the attacker would need to do is have an image of the new code, and then burn it into the device pretty much in the same manner that the factory, or cellphone technicians, do.”

Did The IDF Actually Make Them?

In a report from The Jerusalem Post we’re told that the IDF actually made them with shell companies:

Hungary-based pagers manufacturing company BAC Consulting, which manufactured the pagers that exploded across Lebanon on Tuesday, was an Israeli shell company, the New York Times reported on Thursday, citing three intelligence officers.

The three officers further said that an additional two shell companies were created, which, the NYT noted, assisted in hiding the identities of those involved in manufacturing the pagers.

To look legitimate, the company made pagers for other clients:

The report explained that while the company did produce regular pagers for other clients, those manufactured for Hezbollah were “produced separately, they contained batteries laced with explosive.”

The pagers were sent a few years back:

According to the report, the pagers were first sent to Lebanon in 2022 in a small batch.

Nasrallah created the demand for more pagers when he banned the use of cellphones:

Following a speech made by Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah, where he denounced the use of cellphones - calling them Israel’s “agent” - and promoted more comprehensive use of pagers, more orders for BAC manufactured pagers were reportedly placed by operatives of the Lebanese terrorist organization.

The Hezbollah leader also required the pagers to be on their persons 24/7:

Moreover, according to three defense officials, Nasrallah also ordered Hezbollah officers to carry pagers at all times and banned cell phones from organization meetings. He also reportedly ordered officers to refrain from communicating any details concerning Hezbollah’s movements and plans through cell phones.

Overall, Nasrallah fell right into Israel’s trap:

Since his speech, there was a significant increase in shipments of pagers to Lebanon, with thousands reportedly arriving and being distributed to Hezbollah officers and their allies, the New York Times cited two American intelligence officials.

In the end Israel hit Hezbollah and its leadership in an extremely intense way:

While Hezbollah views these devices as a defensive tool, the NYT noted, Israeli intelligence has characterized them as “buttons” that could be activated at strategic moments, which appears to have been on Tuesday. According to multiple reports, the pagers were set to beep, prompting their owners to see what message Hezbollah’s command sent, only to explode a few seconds later, sowing chaos across Lebanon.

The article ends by telling us what we already know is underselling the numbers:

Hezbollah reported that at least eight of its fighters were killed, with more noncombatants also being killed and wounded.

Three days out after the exploding devices attack more and more details show us that Hezbollah is weaker and weaker. And I haven’t even detailed how the IDF preemptively took out 100 rocket launchers and about 1,000 rockets in them Thursday afternoon which you can read about in this article. Some say that there isn’t an official war going on with Hezbollah and Israel, but apart from troops invading from either side it sure feels like it. Which means we should pray for the peace of Jerusalem now more than ever. A full war from all sides is in the making.