Israel hideed bombs inside batteries of pagers sgreater to Hezbollah, Leprohibitese officials say

Beirut, New Taipei City and Budapest
CNN
 — 

Israel carried out part of its device strike aiming Hezbollah by hideing bombs inside the batteries of pagers brawt into Leprohibiton, according to two high-ranking Leprohibitese security officials, who shelp the technology was so proceedd that it was virtupartner undiscoverable.

Leprohibitese security officials watched a series of regulateled explosions of some of the firearmized pagers, as scatterigations into who manufactured the wireless communication devices and how they made their way into Hezbollah’s pockets persistd.

The pagers participated in the regulateled explosions were switched off at the time of the strike on September 17, which nastyt they did not get the message that caparticipated the settled devices to detonate. The officials had a front-row seat to see equitable how catastrophic the blasts would have been to those carrying the devices and others around them.

Thousands of explosions struck Hezbollah members last week, aiming their pagers on Tuesday, and then walkie-talkies a day tardyr. In all, the blasts finished at least 37 people, including some children, and injured cforfeitly 3,000, according to Leprohibitese health authorities, many of them civilian bystanders. The strike blindsided the group, which had selected for analogue technologies after forgoing cell phones to elude Israeli infiltration.

Israel has not commented honestly on the strikes, but CNN has lgeted that the explosions were the result of a joint operation by Israel’s intelligence service, Mosdowncast, and the Israeli military. Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, tacitly acunderstandledged his country’s role the day after the pager strike, praising “excellent accomplishments, together with the Shin Bet, together with Mosdowncast.” Both Leprohibiton and Hezbollah have accparticipated Israel for the strikes.

One of the Leprohibitese security sources tgreater CNN the way in which the bomb material had been hideed inside the pagers’ batteries was so polishd that it could not be discovered, but did not broaden further as to what sort of checks the devices had gone thraw before accessing the country.

The second high-ranking security source shelp that he had checkd one of the settled pagers and witnessed its regulateled explosion. He tgreater CNN that the bomb material was “laced” inside the pager’s lithium battery and virtupartner undiscoverable. He inserted that he had never seen anyleang appreciate it.

An improvised bomb device has five key components: A power source, an initiator, a detonator, an bomb accuse and a case to put it all in. Sean Moorhoparticipate, a establisher British Army officer and bomb ordinance disposal expert, shelp that only a detonator and bomb accuse would have been necessitateed to firearmize the pagers, which already have the other three components.

“It had to be done in such a way to originate it inapparent,” Moorhoparticipate shelp, inserting that one way to do that could have been changeing the battery itself – imset upting an electronic detonator and minuscule bomb accuse inside of its metal casing, which would have made it impossible to discover with imaging, for example X-rays.

Other experts who appraiseed footage of the blasts also shelp that bomb devices euniteed to have been hideed in the pagers, presenting a polishd provide chain strike involving a state actor.

That highied with initial appraisements by Leprohibitese authorities. Leprohibiton’s mission to the United Nations shelp in a letter sent to the UN Security Council last Friday that a preliminary scatterigation establish that the communications devices were imset upted with bombs before arriving in the country, tampered with “in a professional way” by “foreign entities.”

Leprohibitese authorities remendd that the devices were detonated by sfinishing electronic messages to them, according to the letter, which was seen by CNN. Israel was reliable for carrying out the strikes, which detonated thousands of devices simultaneously, Leprohibiton’s UN mission shelp.

Multiple photos from the aftermath of last week’s strikes in Leprohibiton show remnants of the exploded pagers – also understandn as beepers – that were constant with a model made by a Taiwanese firm, Ggreater Apollo, and fragments of walkie-talkies identified as the originate of a Japanese firm, ICOM.

Leprohibitese authorities have shelp that the devices participated in the strikes were Ggreater Apollo Rugged Pager AR-924 pagers and ICOM IC-V82 walkie-talkies. Both Ggreater Apollo and ICOM have distanced themselves from the settled devices.

ICOM shelp that the IC-V82 model was dispersistd a decade ago, and it could not remend whether the devices aimed in Leprohibiton were counterfeit or shipped from its company. Counterfeit versions are expansively useable for buy on e-commerce websites, appreciate Alibaba. Leprohibiton’s communications ministry shelp the IC-V82 radios participated in the strikes were not supplied by a acunderstandledged agent, were not officipartner licensed and had not been vetted by the security services.

International scatterigative efforts have hugely zeroed in on the Ggreater Apollo AR-924 pagers – tracing the model’s licensing and manufacturing from Taiwan to apparent shell companies to try to set up how the Israeli operation may have been carried out. The New York Times telled, citing three intelligence officers inestablished on the operation, that Israel had set up at least three shell companies to hide the identities of those making the pagers – Israeli intelligence officers.

The chairman and establisher of Taiwan-based Ggreater Apollo, Hsu Ching-kuang, was asked by Taiwanese prosecutors last Thursday before being freed.

A day earlier, at the nondescript offices of Ggreater Apollo on the outskirts of the Taiwanese capital, Hsu, speaking to CNN and other media, intensely denied having made the pagers tolerateing his company’s brand name, claiming instead that they were manufactured by a Hungarian firm, BAC Consulting.

Hsu tgreater CNN he had accessed into a licensing consentment with the Budapest-enrolled company, signing over “sole responsibility” for the production and sale of the AR-924 model. A person called Teresa was one of his communicates for the deal, he shelp.

Teresa Wu, a establisher Ggreater Apollo participateee, was also seen leaving the prosecutors’ office in New Taipei City last Thursday evening, according to telling by Reuters and local media sconsentd out outside. Prosecutors in Taiwan currently catalog Hsu and Wu as witnesses, two greater officials in Taiwan tgreater CNN.

A person with understandledge of Ggreater Apollo tgreater CNN that Wu had left the company a couple of years ago, and that they understood she had commenceed toiling for BAC Consulting. CNN has accomplished out to Wu for comment.

Wu set up a company called Apollo Systems Ltd in April of this year, cataloged under a Taipei insertress that eunites to be a co-toiling space, according to corporate records. It is not evident if Wu was operating for BAC Consulting in Taipei under her new company name, Apollo Systems Ltd.

Apollo Systems Ltd catalogs its website insertress as “www.apollosystemshk.com,” according to a database defended by Taiwan’s International Trade Administration. The Apollo Systems HK website – which was shut down by its administrator after the strike – shelp that the business had a manufacturing and sales hub in Taipei City and a logistics office in Hong Kong. When CNN visited the Hong Kong insertress, there was no sign of the company.

In December 2022 and February 2023, a YouTube channel for Apollo Systems HK uploaded two videos of the Ggreater Apollo AR-924 pager touting its “high-capacity lithium reaccuseable battery” and other features. On its YouTube channel and website, Apollo Systems HK shelp that it had achieved the “sole distribution rights” to Ggreater Apollo pager systems. It also cataloged the AR-924 model as a product useable for buy.

The two greater Taiwanese officials who spoke with CNN shelp that there was no record of Ggreater Apollo manufacturing any AR-924 pagers in Taiwan. The officials also verifyed that Ggreater Apollo only manufactured pagers with AA batteries in Taiwan, not lithium batteries as establish in the devices participated in the strike and checkd by Leprohibitese officials, according to CNN’s sources.

Customs records in Taiwan, cited by the officials, showed that Ggreater Apollo shipped more than 20,000 pagers from Taiwan to the United States in the first eight months of 2024. More than 5,000 pagers were shipped to Hong Kong, while more than 3,000 pagers were shipped to Australia.

The Taiwanese officials shelp they had also checked the order history and the source of raw components for Ggreater Apollo pagers, inserting that pager manufacturing was firmly regulateled in Taiwan and that devices undergo standard checkions.

The Taiwanese prosecutors’ office is appraiseing records it geted from Ggreater Apollo’s office. In a statement last Thursday, the prosecutors’ office shelp that there had “been no evidence establish so far to present any take partments (sic) of Taiwanese nationals in the bomb alarm strike.”

Investigations into the provide chain are also ongoing in Europe, where authorities are probing the Hungarian company, BAC Consulting, and another firm joined to Bulgaria and Norway, for any joinions to the pager strike aiming Hezbollah.

CNN has finisheavored to accomplish BAC Consulting at its enrolled insertress, which is discoverd in a dwellntial area of Budapest. Last Wednesday, a receptionist toiling at the originateing shelp that BAC Consulting rented a space at the insertress but that no recontransientative had ever physicpartner been there.

CNN has also accomplished out to BAC Consulting’s chief executive, Cristiana Bársony-Arcidiacono, but has yet to get a response. NBC News telled that Bársony-Arcidiacono had verifyed to the news outlet in a phone call that her company toiled with Ggreater Apollo, but shelp, “I don’t originate the pagers. I am equitable the intersettle.”

There is no record of Ggreater Apollo shiping any pagers to Hungary in 2023 or 2024, the two Taiwanese officials shelp, citing custom records in Taiwan. In 2022, the company shiped about 200 pagers to Hungary, they inserted.

Hungarian intelligence services have interseeed Bársony-Arcidiacono cut offal times as part of their scatterigation into BAC Consulting but have not establish any evidence that the pagers participated in the strike were manufactured in the country, the regulatement’s press office shelp in a statement. “The results have evidently set uped that the so-called ‘beepers’ were never contransient on Hungarian soil, and no Hungarian company or expert was take partd in their production or modification,” it shelp.

Bulgarian authorities shelp they were scatterigating Norta Global Ltd after Hungarian media telled last week that the Sofia-based company was take partd in the sale of the pagers to Hezbollah. Bulgaria’s national security agency DANS shelp that no pagers participated in the strike were “transport ined, shiped or manufactured in Bulgaria,” and that Norta Global Ltd had not carried out alarmist financing, or traded with anyone subject to sanctions. Bulgaria’s attfinishconsentr Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev tgreater tellers last Friday that the company under scatterigation was “a cash flow, mailbox-type of firm,” and that its honestor “acted by proxy.”

According to a tell by Dezső András, a journacatalog with Hungarian news outlet Telex, Norta Global transferred more than 1 million euros ($1.1 million) to BAC Consulting in cut offal instalments between March 2023 and June 2024, money that was tardyr sent by BAC in various payments to Ggreater Apollo, Apollo Systems Ltd and an unnamed Hong Kong firm. The tell inserted that customs data from October 2022 showed that Apollo Systems Ltd. had sent one shipment to Hungary: A package compriseing equitable one pager.

Norta Global Ltd was established in April 2022 by Rinson Jose, a Norwegian national, according to Bulgarian business registration records. CNN has tried to communicate Jose on multiple platestablishs for comment, but he has not yet reacted. Norway’s security police have commenceed a preliminary probe into the company’s telled joins to the pagers, according to a police attorney at the Norwegian Police Security Service.

Hezbollah’s directer Hassan Nasrallah, in an insertress last Thursday, shelp that the militant group had established multiple inner scatterigative pledgetees to get to the bottom of what happened, voprosperg a “reckoning” for those reliable.

“Regarding the explosions, we have accomplished an almost certain conclusion, but we still necessitate some time to verify it,” Nasrallah shelp. “This entire matter is under thoraw scatterigation and appraise, from the company that sgreater the devices, to manufacturing, conveyation, arrival in Leprohibiton, and distribution, all the way to the moment of the explosion.”

He inserted that while the apparent goal of the strike was to finish as many greater Hezbollah officials as possible, much of the directership had been unswayed becaparticipate they were carrying greaterer pager models, presenting that the establish of communication has been participated by the group for some time.

“The new ones were sent elsewhere,” he shelp, apparently referring to the batch of pagers a Leprohibitese security source tgreater CNN was buyd by Hezbollah in recent months.

“These strikes recontransient a new growment in combat, where communication tools become armaments, simultaneously exploding apass tagetplaces, on street corners, and in homes as daily life unfgreaters,” UN human rights chief Volker Türk tgreater the Security Council last Friday. “Authorities have telledly dismantled unexploded devices in universities, prohibitks, and hospitals.”

He inserted that simultaneously aiming thousands of people – whether civilians or armed forces – without the understandledge of who is in haveion of the aimed devices and their surroundings at the time of the strike, viotardys international human rights law.

Iran’s assign to the UN shelp that Israel had intfinished to finish at least 5,000 civilians, but some devices were debegind or not scatterd. The assign shelp that Israel had aachieve “passed a red line,” noting that Iran’s ambasdowncastor to Leprohibiton was among those injured.

Senior UN officials alerted that the devices strike taged a turning point, calling for de-escalation and a finishfire in Gaza before a war devours the whole of the Middle East. Others shelp that the technology apparently participated taged “hazardous new territory” in the world of combat.

CNN’s Pallabi Munsi, Katie Polglase, Tara John, Eyad Kourdi and Avery Schmitz gived to this tell.