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It's funny to think that there are members of Hezbollah here on HN.

by booleandilemma 2y ago

greenavocado 2y ago
[flagged]
- strictnein 2y ago
  Where is this all from?
  - greenavocado 2y ago
    Twitter
- dekhn 2y ago
  Was this content generated by AI?
  - greenavocado 2y ago
    Nope
- scotty79 2y ago
  Half of that doesn't sound plausible at all.
  - greenavocado 2y ago
    Which part are you having trouble with?
    - scotty79 2y ago
      The randomness of the items supposedly blowing up. This "report" seems more like incitement to panic rather than accurate information. Especially given that the pagers weren't naturally explosive. Instead the explosive was put into them at some point in the delivery chain.
      - greenavocado 2y ago
        Looks like many more things were compromised though a supply chain attack. In unrelated news, the American University of Beirut Medican Center replaced the pagers of their doctors and staff two weeks ago. https://www.nna-leb.gov.lb/en/miscellaneous/722089/aub-medical-center-denies-allegations-linking-new https://www.nna-leb.gov.lb/en/miscellaneous/722089/aub-medic... NNA - The American University of Beirut Medical Center announced in a statement: "At a crucial time when AUBMC physicians, nurses, and staff have been fully mobilized to deal with the aftermath of today's injuries, several malicious social media outlets have started spreading rumors and conspiracy theories about the types of communications systems AUB has in place, attempting to link AUB to this tragic event. The university categorically denies these baseless allegations. Following are the facts. Our paging system infrastructure was upgraded in April 2024. The Go-Live for switching to the new system took place on August 29, 2024. The scope of this upgrade was to enhance emergency and code communication, as several devices and systems had become obsolete. The American University of Beirut Medical Center has received over 160 seriously injured individuals over the last three hours, with more to come. Our full focus must be on saving lives and caring for the wounded to the best of our ability. Rather than waste time spreading baseless rumors, we urge all to rally to support AUBMC and the heroic but overwhelmed medical system in Lebanon."
- alwa 2y ago
  Who is “we” here? My more excitable Twitter-infected friends have been speaking about these scraps of news items in “we” terms too. Is it just that the theatricality of this whole thing has ginned up a good ol’-fashioned Twitter mob “investigation”?
  - greenavocado 2y ago
    https://twitter.com/DropSiteNews/status/1836431337168806113 https://twitter.com/DropSiteNews/status/1836431337168806113
hiddencost 2y ago
Given how indiscriminate the IED campaign in Lebanon is, it's quite reasonable to believe the parent poster is merely Lebanese and scared.
- alwa 2y ago
  Indiscriminate? Aren’t these operations targeting individual pieces of military operational hardware, the sort of thing that only combatants have any reason to have, and that the combatant force keeps confined to its own personnel for security reasons? Tawdry, unsportsmanlike, I can see those lines of criticism—but how does it get much more discriminate than this?
  - borski 2y ago
    Yes. It is the definition of discriminate. The only more discriminate attack would be individual in-person assassination. Everyone seems to want to find a reason to claim Israel is targeting civilians here, but they aren’t. This is surgical, which is what everyone wanted Israel to do more of, when it came to how they wage war.
    - nemomarx 2y ago
      It's more discriminate than bombs, but like poisoning food and hoping it gets to the right target I think anything where you don't actually see the person before choosing to detonate isn't that surgical either. They couldn't actually check if the pagers were on the targets at the time or etc.
      - borski 2y ago
        But they didn’t arbitrarily poison food and hope it got to their target, poisoning all sorts of civilians along the way. That is a strawman. These devices were not used by non-militants. These devices were used for communications, by militants. No civilian was “playing with” or using these devices, as they were issued by Hezbollah to their operatives. It would be no different from targeting specific guns used by Hezbollah and booby-trapping them to shoot backwards. That is a targeted attack.
darby_nine 2y ago
[flagged]
diggan 2y ago
> It's funny to think that there are members of Hezbollah here on HN. It's worth remembering that Hezbollah as a whole is more than just the paramilitary branch which is commonly referred to as a terrorist organization. Some entities (like the EU) only considers the paramilitary arm of Hezbollah as a terrorist group, while the rest is a proper political organization. Like always, things aren't quite as black and white as many want it to be.
- dralley 2y ago
  >Some entities (like the EU) only considers the paramilitary arm of Hezbollah as a terrorist group, while the rest is a proper political organization. And that decision is much more political than it is legal or rational. Imagine arguing that ISIS officials are off-limits because they're "not paramilitary". Hezbollah's occupation & control of southern Lebanon is against international law in the first place, but nobody actually wants to deal with that problem. I've never seen a comment that criticizes Hezbollah violations of UN Resolution 1701 the way that people criticize Israel.
- lenerdenator 2y ago
  Sounds to me like they need to disarm, then. Same with Hamas, really. At this point anything either organization does basically violates the "just war" (oxymoron, I know) tenant of only attacking an enemy when you believe you have a reasonable chance of success.
  - diggan 2y ago
    > Sounds to me like they need to disarm, then. I'd want all militaries to disarm too, unlikely to happen unless everyone starts to agree to not get into everyone else's business. So besides getting everyone to disarm, what could we do?
    - lenerdenator 2y ago
      Generally speaking, when the Israelis mutually recognize Arab nations, they respect the terms of the agreement. Jordan and Egypt are examples. So long as the other party says "you get to exist" and doesn't actively tolerate anti-Israeli militant activity within their borders, Israel won't use its military against them. There are probably some exceptions to this rule, and yes, their occupation of the West Bank violates international law, but attacking just no longer works. Gaza lies in ruins and the IDF conducts operations in the area at will. There are currently thousands of people wrapping their electronics in aluminum foil in Lebanon. Disarming and sitting down to talk in brokered negotiations is probably more effective at this point.

It's funny to think that there are members of Hezbollah here on HN.

greenavocado 2y ago

[flagged]

strictnein 2y ago
Where is this all from?
- greenavocado 2y ago
  Twitter
dekhn 2y ago
Was this content generated by AI?
- greenavocado 2y ago
  Nope
scotty79 2y ago
Half of that doesn't sound plausible at all.
- greenavocado 2y ago
  Which part are you having trouble with?
  - scotty79 2y ago
    The randomness of the items supposedly blowing up. This "report" seems more like incitement to panic rather than accurate information. Especially given that the pagers weren't naturally explosive. Instead the explosive was put into them at some point in the delivery chain.
    - greenavocado 2y ago
      Looks like many more things were compromised though a supply chain attack. In unrelated news, the American University of Beirut Medican Center replaced the pagers of their doctors and staff two weeks ago. https://www.nna-leb.gov.lb/en/miscellaneous/722089/aub-medical-center-denies-allegations-linking-new https://www.nna-leb.gov.lb/en/miscellaneous/722089/aub-medic... NNA - The American University of Beirut Medical Center announced in a statement: "At a crucial time when AUBMC physicians, nurses, and staff have been fully mobilized to deal with the aftermath of today's injuries, several malicious social media outlets have started spreading rumors and conspiracy theories about the types of communications systems AUB has in place, attempting to link AUB to this tragic event. The university categorically denies these baseless allegations. Following are the facts. Our paging system infrastructure was upgraded in April 2024. The Go-Live for switching to the new system took place on August 29, 2024. The scope of this upgrade was to enhance emergency and code communication, as several devices and systems had become obsolete. The American University of Beirut Medical Center has received over 160 seriously injured individuals over the last three hours, with more to come. Our full focus must be on saving lives and caring for the wounded to the best of our ability. Rather than waste time spreading baseless rumors, we urge all to rally to support AUBMC and the heroic but overwhelmed medical system in Lebanon."
alwa 2y ago
Who is “we” here? My more excitable Twitter-infected friends have been speaking about these scraps of news items in “we” terms too. Is it just that the theatricality of this whole thing has ginned up a good ol’-fashioned Twitter mob “investigation”?
- greenavocado 2y ago
  https://twitter.com/DropSiteNews/status/1836431337168806113 https://twitter.com/DropSiteNews/status/1836431337168806113

hiddencost 2y ago

Given how indiscriminate the IED campaign in Lebanon is, it's quite reasonable to believe the parent poster is merely Lebanese and scared.

alwa 2y ago
Indiscriminate? Aren’t these operations targeting individual pieces of military operational hardware, the sort of thing that only combatants have any reason to have, and that the combatant force keeps confined to its own personnel for security reasons? Tawdry, unsportsmanlike, I can see those lines of criticism—but how does it get much more discriminate than this?
- borski 2y ago
  Yes. It is the definition of discriminate. The only more discriminate attack would be individual in-person assassination. Everyone seems to want to find a reason to claim Israel is targeting civilians here, but they aren’t. This is surgical, which is what everyone wanted Israel to do more of, when it came to how they wage war.
  - nemomarx 2y ago
    It's more discriminate than bombs, but like poisoning food and hoping it gets to the right target I think anything where you don't actually see the person before choosing to detonate isn't that surgical either. They couldn't actually check if the pagers were on the targets at the time or etc.
    - borski 2y ago
      But they didn’t arbitrarily poison food and hope it got to their target, poisoning all sorts of civilians along the way. That is a strawman. These devices were not used by non-militants. These devices were used for communications, by militants. No civilian was “playing with” or using these devices, as they were issued by Hezbollah to their operatives. It would be no different from targeting specific guns used by Hezbollah and booby-trapping them to shoot backwards. That is a targeted attack.

darby_nine 2y ago

[flagged]

diggan 2y ago

> It's funny to think that there are members of Hezbollah here on HN. It's worth remembering that Hezbollah as a whole is more than just the paramilitary branch which is commonly referred to as a terrorist organization. Some entities (like the EU) only considers the paramilitary arm of Hezbollah as a terrorist group, while the rest is a proper political organization. Like always, things aren't quite as black and white as many want it to be.

dralley 2y ago
>Some entities (like the EU) only considers the paramilitary arm of Hezbollah as a terrorist group, while the rest is a proper political organization. And that decision is much more political than it is legal or rational. Imagine arguing that ISIS officials are off-limits because they're "not paramilitary". Hezbollah's occupation & control of southern Lebanon is against international law in the first place, but nobody actually wants to deal with that problem. I've never seen a comment that criticizes Hezbollah violations of UN Resolution 1701 the way that people criticize Israel.
lenerdenator 2y ago
Sounds to me like they need to disarm, then. Same with Hamas, really. At this point anything either organization does basically violates the "just war" (oxymoron, I know) tenant of only attacking an enemy when you believe you have a reasonable chance of success.
- diggan 2y ago
  > Sounds to me like they need to disarm, then. I'd want all militaries to disarm too, unlikely to happen unless everyone starts to agree to not get into everyone else's business. So besides getting everyone to disarm, what could we do?
  - lenerdenator 2y ago
    Generally speaking, when the Israelis mutually recognize Arab nations, they respect the terms of the agreement. Jordan and Egypt are examples. So long as the other party says "you get to exist" and doesn't actively tolerate anti-Israeli militant activity within their borders, Israel won't use its military against them. There are probably some exceptions to this rule, and yes, their occupation of the West Bank violates international law, but attacking just no longer works. Gaza lies in ruins and the IDF conducts operations in the area at will. There are currently thousands of people wrapping their electronics in aluminum foil in Lebanon. Disarming and sitting down to talk in brokered negotiations is probably more effective at this point.