ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Tensions have been rising on Lebanon's border with Israel, with fears that daily missile strikes between the two sides could escalate into all-out war. Well, today the conflict took an unexpected turn - an apparent synchronized attack on pagers used by Hezbollah members. Lebanese health authorities say at least nine people were killed and more than 2,700 wounded when the handheld devices exploded across the country. NPR's Jane Arraf is covering the story. Hi, Jane.
JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: Hi, Ari.
SHAPIRO: So many questions about this. I've never heard of anything like it. What more can you tell us about how this unfolded?
ARRAF: Well, I guess first, these pagers - not the old-style pagers some people might remember - are messaging devices used by Hezbollah for secure communications. They're a replacement to cellphones, which are generally considered more easily hacked. Hezbollah fighters, officials, office staff carry them. And this afternoon, at the same time, essentially, across the country, many of them exploded. You can imagine the damage that something exploding in your pocket or your hand could do. Lebanon's health ministry said at least nine people were killed, including a child, and more than 2,700 people injured, 200 of them critically.
SHAPIRO: As we said, Lebanon had already been on edge. What was the impact of this attack? How shocking was it?
ARRAF: Really shocking. And it's hard to explain just how used to bad things happening Lebanese are, but this has been largely a conflict, including - that involves warplanes, artillery, drones. This one, though, was very different. The health ministry declared a state of emergency, telling hospitals across the country to prepare for mass casualties and urging people to give blood. And it told anyone with a pager to get rid of it until authorities could figure out what was going on. NPR producer Jawad Rizkallah went to a hospital in the central Beirut neighborhood of Hamra. That's far from Hezbollah areas. But even there, there were a stream of ambulances and cars with dark-tinted windows used by officials and security people rushing in with the wounded. Here's how he described it.
JAWAD RIZKALLAH, BYLINE: It's a very tense situation, and no filming is allowed. The army is here as well as ambulances coming from the Islamic Health Authority. Ambulances keep coming. It's a scene of chaos.
ARRAF: One man who was there to donate blood said he had been to other hospitals as well. And there, too, he described crowds and chaos as the wounded were brought in.
SHAPIRO: Do you have any more detail on who the casualties are?
ARRAF: Well, the health minister, Firas Abiad, said an 8-year-old child was killed.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
FIRAS ABIAD: (Speaking Arabic).
ARRAF: And he said most of the injuries to the casualties were to the abdomen, the legs, the hands and the face, including a lot of eye injuries. Reuters said it viewed footage that indicated many of the pagers buzzed first and then exploded as people reached for them. Iran says its ambassador to Lebanon was slightly wounded. And that's expected, Ari, to be a new reason for Iran to seek revenge against Israel, either directly or through Hezbollah, which it arms.
The U.S. State Department said it urged Iran not to take advantage of the situation. And the pagers exploded mostly in the south of Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley and Beirut's southern suburbs, where there's strong support for Hezbollah. A lot of the casualties were Hezbollah fighters, medics, office workers but also civilians standing nearby.
SHAPIRO: And any sense of what today's events mean in the bigger picture?
ARRAF: Very worrying. The White House special envoy was in Israel yesterday, Amos Hochstein, in his long-running efforts to get Israel and Lebanon to negotiate an end to the border fighting. But Hezbollah has made it clear that will stop only when there's a cease-fire in Gaza - and meanwhile, Israeli officials repeating that war is coming and Lebanon should prepare for it.
SHAPIRO: That's NPR's Jane Arraf. Thank you.
ARRAF: Thank you.
SHAPIRO: Since we spoke with Jane earlier today, NPR has learned that Israel has privately admitted to U.S. officials that it was, in fact, behind the widespread attack. We'll have more on that across the network as the story develops.
(SOUNDBITE OF JORJA SMITH SONG, "GREATEST GIFT") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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