Why Hezbollah still uses pagers in the smartphone era – Firstpost

On Tuesday (September 17) at 3:30 pm (local time) Lebanon witnessed the most bizarre incident of all time, when Hezbollah announced that hundreds of pagers carried by its members had exploded almost simultaneously, injuring at least 2,800 people and killing at least nine.

The explosions, which lasted almost an hour, raised many questions about how such small charges could have exploded at the same time.

Shortly after the explosions, social media channels were flooded with surveillance and phone footage showing hospitals flooded with injured people, as well as visible explosions at waist level and images of damaged pagers, Musa, a resident of Beirut’s southern suburbs, said AFP“In my entire life, I’ve never seen anyone walking down the street… and then it exploded. People didn’t know what was happening.”

Another witness describing the scenes said: CNN“There was blood on the roads and people were being taken to hospital in ambulances. But we didn’t know what was happening,” he said.

Shortly after, Hezbollah also blamed Israel for the complex attack and vowed revenge. Meanwhile, the IDF has chosen to remain silent on the matter.

Amid rising tensions and fears that they could lead to further escalation in the West Asian region, we take a closer look at what these devices are and why Hezbollah is using this technology in the age of smartphones.

What are pagers?

Also known as a beeper, the pager was the first compact mobile communication device to hit the mass market—a precursor to the smartphones that almost everyone uses today. Designed to look like small boxes, these electronic devices allow the user to receive messages and sound alerts.

A pager uses its own frequency to send and receive messages. These messages can be numeric – a phone number – or alphanumeric – text.

While smartphones are the standard today, pagers have been around for decades, with some reports claiming the first pager-like system was developed by the Detroit Police Department back in 1921.

It was not until 1959 that Motorola used the term “pager” when it began producing personal radio communication devices that combined elements of a walkie-talkie and a car radio.

Pagers soon became the most popular communication device in the world. American pager manufacturer Spok reports that in 1994 there were at least 61 million pagers in circulation worldwide.

And today, even though smartphones are everywhere, pagers are still used in some sectors, such as hospitals. A 2017 study published in the Journal of Hospital Medicine found that nearly 80 percent of hospital doctors surveyed used pagers, and half of the messages received through them were related to patient care.

Search and rescue and other emergency services organisations also use pagers today. In fact, in 2019, when the National Health Service in the UK ordered the removal of pagers, many NHS staff took to social media to outline the reasons why pagers remain popular with care teams, and to endorse pagers as key tools for coordinating and delivering patient care.

What are the benefits of using a pager?

Proponents of the device praise the pager for its simplicity and effectiveness. Communication experts note that pagers cover a wider area and are more reliable, especially in areas where cellular coverage is weak.

In addition, they have minimal features, making them easy to use and less susceptible to technical faults. One-way pagers are also mostly untraceable because there is no signal transmission to the base station that sends the signal in the first place.

They also have a longer battery life than phones, making them even more reliable and useful in emergencies.

Why does Hezbollah use them?

In addition to being used by medical and emergency services, pagers have also become the preferred means of communication among criminals.

Hezbollah, long known for its secrecy, has used pagers extensively to communicate with one another because the device is nearly impossible to trace. Just six months ago, Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah called on Hezbollah members and their families in southern Lebanon to surrender their cellphones. “Turn them off, bury them, put them in an iron box and lock them up,” he said in February. “Do it for safety and to protect the blood and dignity of the people.”

“The collaborator (with the Israelis) is the cell phone in your hands, and in the hands of your wife and your children. That cell phone is a collaborator and a killer,” he continued in his fiery speech.

In his speech, he suggested that Israel was using its advanced technology to hack into phones and access valuable information.

Hezbollah has also been wary of cellphones after Israel used an exploding phone to kill a Hamas bomb maker in 1996. Since then, the Lebanon-based militants have been using a private, landline telecommunications network since the early 2000s.

Military analyst Elijah Magnier said: Al-Jazeera that Hezbollah used pagers because it allowed it to avoid interception by Israel.

In addition, the pagers operate on a message-based basis. This helps the militant group send simple instructions that are encrypted and safe from prying eyes in Israel.

Emily Harding, a former CIA analyst now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, also said that giving up cellphones makes Hezbollah members much harder to track.

There is a downside, however, she noted. “These countermeasures also make Hezbollah’s leaders much less effective in communicating quickly with their troops,” she was quoted as saying. Reuters Agency.

What’s next?

Hezbollah vows retaliation against Israel after pager attacks; Lebanon’s information minister calls the explosions an act of “Israeli aggression.”

The attack marks another escalation of tensions between Hezbollah and Israel, with experts saying it is dangerous for the region. It could also affect ceasefire talks in Gaza, which would also be a diplomatic defeat for the U.S., which has supported Israel since the beginning of the Gaza war and played a leading role in the ceasefire negotiations, all in an effort to maintain stability in West Asia.

With information from the agency