Israel planned operation to blow up pagers in Lebanon for 15 years, source says

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Israel is involved in the production of pagers that exploded on Hezbollah militants. According to sources, Israel could have been planning this operation for 15 years.

This was reported by the ABC News channel, citing a source in American intelligence.

According to the source, the American CIA did not want to use this tactic for a long time, since there was a significant risk to innocent people.

The attack involved front companies, with Israeli intelligence officers and their assets acting as fronts for a legitimate company that manufactured the pagers, a source confirmed to ABC News. Some of those involved in manufacturing the devices did not even know who they were really working for.

Israel's involvement in the pager production was initially reported by The New York Times. The pagers were loaded with between one and two ounces of explosives and a remote trigger, the sources said.

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At least 37 people have been killed and 2,931 injured in pager or walkie-talkie explosions over the past two days, Lebanon's Health Minister Firass al-Abyad said.

ABC News sent inquiries to BAC Consulting, the Hungarian company contracted to make the pagers on behalf of Gold Apollo in Taiwan. No one has responded.

The Hungarian company was a reseller with no manufacturing or operational facility in Hungary, Budapest said.

On Sept. 18, portable radios and pagers used by Hezbollah militants detonated in southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said the group's top brass had old pagers, not the new ones, which exploded.

— Over two days, the enemy wanted to kill at least 5,000 people. … The enemy knew that the number of pagers available was 4,000. Not all the pagers were distributed, some of them were turned off,— Hassan Nasrallah said.

The Israeli military has refused to comment on its involvement in the explosions.

Prepared by: Sergei Daga