Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu  for the first time admitted that Israel was behind the attacks on Hezbollah’s pager and walkie-talkies, which killed at least 39 people and wounded over 3,000, as reported by The Times of Israel. His statement came during weekly cabinet meeting. Reportedly, the attacks carried out on September 17 and 18, had targeted thousands of handheld pagers and hundreds of walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah members across Lebanon and Syria.

Israel had not publicly claimed responsibility for the attacks that targeted Hezbollah earlier. The attacks saw pagers and walkie-talkies explode in two waves on September 17 and 18, resulting in at least 39 deaths.

What Did Israel PM Say?

Netanyahu said, “The pager operation and the elimination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah were carried out despite the opposition of senior officials in the defence establishment and those responsible for them in the political echelon.” With his statement, he took slight dig at recently fired defence minister, Yoav Gallant. Netanyahu had dismissed defence minister Yoav Gallant last week, citing a lack of trust, and replaced him with Israel Katz, who previously served as foreign minister.

The Times of Israel reported that Lebanon said nearly 3,000 others were wounded in the attack. The tolls did not differentiate between civilians and members of the terror group, and among the wounded was Tehran’s ambassador to Lebanon Mojtaba Amani.

Notably, in the aftermath, various media outlets reported that the attack was a highly sophisticated Israeli intelligence operation years in the making in which Hezbollah was fooled into purchasing the compromised devices.

Series of Israeli airstrikes followed the explosions that took out much of Hezbollah’s command structure, including Nasrallah, and an ongoing limited ground operation in southern Lebanon to eliminate the immediate threats posed by the terror group to Israel’s northern border communities.

Earlier, Lebanese health ministry announced that the country’s death toll in the Israel-Hezbollah war had crossed 3,000. However, the figure does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had estimated that some 3,000 Hezbollah operatives had been killed in the conflict.