Hacker News Reader

Comment by giraffe_lady | Hacker News Reader

The brilliance in the targeting was in doing pagers, which are disproportionately carried by doctors and other medical workers. One of the most effective acts of terrorism in history.

View on HN

You seem to be under the impression that they targeted pagers that were distributed through civilian channels. These were pagers that were purchased BY Hezbollah to be used on Hezbollah's private, secure network, not on a public network. These were not pagers used by a hospital for normal healthcare work. Healthcare workers were carrying these pagers because Hezbollah effectively serves as a shadow state in Lebanon. So if a healthcare worker had one of these pagers, it was because they were part of that hierarchy.

Again, so what? You aren't off the hook because of the actions of your enemies. It was obvious these would be going off around civilians, in homes and public spaces, including hospitals, and they chose to go through with the attack knowing this. That the civilians who would be around them would have no particular reason to fear or suspect this attack, because the vector was a common daily object.

It was an attack on civilians in pursuit of a non-military political goal. Terrorism. I think it was pretty successful on the terms of the people who carried it out but call it what it is.

We literally have videos of these going off in public spaces. The explosions were weak enough that people literally inches away were unharmed. The only way to be seriously injured is to be holding it in your hands or against your body.

You cannot seriously call it an attack "on civilians" - you especially cannot say that it's in pursuit of a non-military goal when it kicked off a literal military operation by crippling Hezbollah communications and (literally crippling) hundreds/thousands of their fighters before a land invasion of the southern border areas of Lebanon. And in any case, all war is politics.

The explosions were in fact strong enough that innocent people, including children, died https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Lebanon_electronic_device...

That doesn't necessarily mean the blast radius was large. The 9 year old was killed while holding the pager.

> Fatima was in the kitchen on Tuesday when a pager on the table began to beep, her aunt said. She picked up the device to bring it to her father and was holding it when it exploded, mangling her face and leaving the room covered in blood, she said.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/18/world/middleeast/lebanon-...

Oh, I didn't know this. Innocent people were still killed and maimed by shrapnel. The other children aged 11 was killed when his father's pager detonated

hmm maybe you don't know there's "intentional homicide" and "unintentional homicide", and those two differ extremely in court?

seems like you like being sarcastic, but don't know basic stuff even 15 year olds know

The comment I was answering above above was saying that explosions were so weak that people inches away were unarmed. The doctors in Lebanon would probably dissent

Such amazingly precise bombs that they can kill Hezbollah leadership with effectiveness while "people literally inches away were unharmed". Maybe tone down the rhetoric some.

You're strawmanning.

I didn't claim that they were particularly lethal. In fact, they were not particularly lethal. Thousands of pagers exploded and only 12 people were killed despite these devices being held directly up to the face or against the skin (pockets).

They were as close to non-lethal incapacitation, even against targets, as it is possible to get in war. When even the targets are rarely killed by the explosion, obviously that results in fewer unintended victims being hurt/killed.

It wasn't a non-military political goal. It had a military purpose of taking out the communications network and personnel of a group that was actively engaged in combat.

this

stark constrast to hezbollah's direct attack on civilians:

1. directly targeted civilians 2. direct action (not remote) 3. intentionally brutal (beheadings, rapes)

...what are they, animals?

pager attack is, however scary it looks, rather more "reserved and gentlemen-ly way" of doing things:

1. targeted hezbolla militants (would average civilian use walkietalkie?) 2. indirect action

for anyone saying otherwise, how more "gentlemen-ly" should israel be? do nothing? "talk" with the leaders? waste more precious lives by directly sending troops without any prior action?

I just don't get why people talk negatively about the walkietalkie boomboom campaign -- it's a masterpiece of "trying the most not to kill civilians but doing your job"

Hezbollah has not been known to behead and rape civilians and has in fact condemned the use of these tactics by Islamists. This conflation really draws into question the quality of your analysis.

They go off around civilians, in homes and public spaces, including hospitals because guerrillas and terrorists are not regular soldiers and imbed themselves in homes and public spaces, including hospitals.

They masquerade as civilians and use civilians as shields. This is why we have regular uniformed soldiers and separate places for them to do their military shit.

The pagers that were targeted were exclusively used by Hezbollah combatants, procured by Hezbollah, linked to an encrypted military network Hezbollah fought a civil war in Lebanon to established, triggered by a message encrypted to that network. The bombs consisted of 6 grams of PETN, yielding a 35kJ blast, approximately the size of 5-10 cherry bombs, or 2% of the raw explosive yield of an M67 grenade --- with the key difference that the pagers were just pagers, with no metal parts introduced (deliberately, to avoid detection by Hezbollah), unlike fragmentation grenades, whose lethality (at 5m) stems from the hardened steel shrapnel they project.

(The device and procurement details here are from Reuters).

So no, I don't think your point about doctors and medical workers is well taken.

> One of the most effective acts of terrorism in history.

It's what "israel" specializes in. When you read the history of "israel", it's literally a series of acts of terrorism.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com