Hezbollah exploding pagers latest: At least nine dead ‘including eight-year-old girl’ in mass Lebanon attack

The Iraqi government and an Iran-backed Iraqi militia are promising to send assistance to Lebanon.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani ordered Iraqi medical and emergency service teams to be sent, his office said in a statement.

The Kataeb Hezbollah militia, one of the most powerful among Iraq’s Iranian-backed armed groups, said in a separate statement that it would “put all our capabilities in the hands of the brothers in Lebanon.”

“We are fully prepared to go with them to the end, and to send fighters, equipment, and support, whether on the technical or logistical level,” it said.

The US continues to believe that there needs to be a diplomatic solution to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said on Tuesday.

Lebanon’s Hezbollah promised to retaliate after blaming Israel for detonating pagers on Tuesday that killed at least eight people and wounded 2,750 others, including many of the militant group’s fighters and Iran’s envoy to Beirut.

“So we continue, we continue to believe that there … should be a diplomatic resolution to this,” Jean Pierre said.

The United States has it is gathering information after at least nine people were killed and some 2,750 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members – including fighters and medics – detonated simultaneously across Lebanon.

State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told a regular news briefing the US was not involved in the incidents and did not know who was responsible. Lebanon’s Hezbollah threatened to punish Israel in response to the incidents.

“We are gathering information on this incident,” Miller said. “I can tell you that the US was not involved in it. The US was not aware of this incident in advance.

“We’re collecting information in the same way that journalists are across the world, to gather the facts about what might have happened,” Miller added.

In response to a question, Miller said the United States was always concerned about any incident that can raise tensions in Middle East and urged Iran not to take advantage of any incident to raise instability.

Miller also said that civilians were not legitimate targets for any type of operation.

Prominent Hezbollah politician Ali Ammar has told journalists that there will be retaliation in time after his son, Mahdi, was killed.

“This is a new Israeli aggression against Lebanon,” Mr Ammar said. “The resistance will retaliate in a suitable way at the suitable time.”

A Hezbollah official said the wounded include the son of Hezbollah’s Hassan Fadlallah and the son of senior security official Wafiq Safa. The official spoke on condition of anonymity.

In a strongly-worded statement, Hamas has responded to the detonations in neighbouring Lebanon which has seen nearly 3,000 people injured.

The group, who have been fighting Israel in the besieged enclave of Gaza for nearly a year, are closely affiliated with Hezbollah.

Hamas similarily blamed the Israeli military for the pager attack and said: “We hold the occupation government fully responsible for the repercussions of this serious crime.”

Israel have not responded to allegations they are behind the attack.

Without commenting directly on the explosions in Lebanon, an Israeli military spokesman said the chief of staff, Major General Herzi Halevi, had met with senior officers on Tuesday evening to assess the situation.

No policy change was announced but “vigilance must continue to be maintained”, he said.

Earlier on Tuesday, Israel’s domestic security agency said it had foiled a plot by Lebanese militant group Hezbollah to assassinate a former senior defence official in the coming days.

The Shin Bet agency, which did not name the official, said in a statement it had seized an explosive device attached to a remote detonation system, using a mobile phone and a camera that Hezbollah had planned to operate from Lebanon.

Shin Bet said the attempted attack was similar to a Hezbollah plot foiled in Tel Aviv a year ago, without giving further details.

Lebanon’s foreign ministry has condemned what they have called an “Israeli cyber attack,” in which hundreds of handheld pagers exploded across Lebanon and parts of Syria.

The ministry said in a statement that it is preparing to submit a complaint to the UN Security Council.

“This dangerous and deliberate Israeli escalation is accompanied by Israeli threats to expand the scope of the war against Lebanon on a large scale, and by the intransigence of Israeli’s positions calling for more bloodshed, destruction and devastation,” it said. Israel has not commented.

At least 14 people have been wounded in Syria when pagers used by Hezbollah fighters exploded, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British war monitor.

In a statement, they said: “Fourteen people whose nationalities are unknown have been wounded in Damascus and its countryside after pagers used by Hezbollah exploded.”

Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani, was slightly injured on Tuesday by the explosion of an electronic pager, Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency reported.

“Amani has a superficial injury and is currently under observation in a hospital,” Fars quoted a source as saying.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, in a phone call with his Lebanese counterpart, strongly condemned the “terrorist attack” and thanked Lebanon for providing immediate medical treatment to Amani, Iranian state media reported.

After Tuesday’s blasts, a Reuters journalist saw ambulances rushing through the southern suburbs of the capital Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, amid widespread panic. A security source said that devices were also exploding in the south of Lebanon.

At Mt. Lebanon hospital, an eyewitness saw motorcycles rushing to the emergency room, where people with their hands bloodied were screaming in pain.

The head of the Nabatieh public hospital in the south of the country, Hassan Wazni, said that around 40 wounded people were being treated at his facility. The wounds included injuries to the face, eyes and limbs.

Groups of people have huddled at the entrance of buildings to check on people they knew who may have been wounded.