First exploding pagers, now exploding two way radios ...

BEIRUT, Sept 18 (Reuters) - Hand-held radios used by Hezbollah detonated late on Wednesday afternoon across Lebanon's south and in Beirut's southern suburbs, a security source and a witness said, further hiking tensions with Israel a day after similar explosions launched via the group's pagers. At least one of the blasts took place near a funeral organized by Iran-backed Hezbollah for those killed the previous day when thousands of pagers used by the group exploded across the country and wounded many of the group's fighters.


The group, which was thrown briefly into disarray by the pager attacks, said on Wednesday it had attacked Israeli artillery positions with rockets in the first strike at its arch-foe since blasts wounded thousands of its members in Lebanon and raised the prospect of a wider Middle East war.
The hand-held radios were purchased by Hezbollah five months ago, around the same time that the pagers were bought, said a security source. Israel's spy agency Mossad, which has a long history of sophisticated operations on foreign soil, planted explosives inside pagers imported by Hezbollah months before Tuesday's detonations, a senior Lebanese security source and another source told Reuters.

The death toll rose to 12, including two children, Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said on Wednesday. Tuesday's attack wounded nearly 3,000 people, including many of the militant group's fighters and Iran's envoy to Beirut.

A Taiwanese pager maker denied that it had produced the pager devices which exploded in an audacious attack that raised the prospect of a full-scale war between the Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel.
Gold Apollo said the devices were made by under license by a company called BAC, based in Hungary's capital Budapest.
There was no immediate word on when Hezbollah had launched its latest rocket attack, but normally the group announces such strikes shortly after carrying them out, suggesting it fired at the Israeli artillery positions on Wednesday.

Hezbollah has vowed to retaliate against Israel, whose military declined to comment on the blasts. The two sides have been engaged in cross-border warfare since the Gaza conflict erupted last October, fuelling fears of a wider Middle East conflict that could drag in the United States and Iran.
Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi accused Israel of pushing the Middle East to the brink of a regional war by orchestrating a dangerous escalation on many fronts.
"Hezbollah wants to avoid an all-out war. It still wants to avoid one. But given the scale, the impact on families, on civilians, there will be pressure for a stronger response," said Mohanad Hage Ali of the Carnegie Middle East Center.
Hezbollah, Iran's most powerful proxy in the Middle East, said in a statement it would continue to support Hamas in Gaza and Israel should await a response to the pager "massacre" which left fighters and others bloodied, hospitalised or dead.
One Hezbollah official said the detonation was the group's "biggest security breach" in its history.
Footage from hospitals reviewed by Reuters showed men with various injuries, some to the face, some with missing fingers and gaping wounds at the hip where the pagers were likely worn.
The plot appears to have been many months in the making, several sources told Reuters. It followed a series of assassinations of Hezbollah and Hamas commanders and leaders blamed on Israel since the start of the Gaza war.

Hacked pagers injure dozens - maybe hundreds in Beirut.

BEIRUT: VARIOUS SOURCES — Dozens, maybe hundreds of people were wounded in Beirut’s suburbs and other parts of Lebanon after their handheld pagers exploded Tuesday, Lebanese state media and security officials said. It wasn’t immediately clear if people were killed.

A senior military intelligence official and an official with a Lebanese group with knowledge of the situation, both of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said that pagers carried by Hezbollah members were detonated. The second official said it was believed to be an Israeli attack.

The Associated Press reached out to the Israeli military, which declined to comment.

Photos and videos from Beirut’s southern suburbs circulating on social media and in local media showed people lying on the pavement with wounds on their hands or near their pants pockets.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah previously warned the group’s members not to carry cellphones, saying that they could be used by Israel to track their movements and to carry out targeted strikes.

Lebanon’s Health Ministry called on all hospitals to be on alert to take in emergency patients and for people who own pagers to get away from them. It also asked health workers to avoid using wireless devices. A Hezbollah official told Reuters news agency it constituted the "biggest security breach yet" since hostilities with Israel escalated 11 months ago in parallel with the Gaza war.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. However, the events come hours after Israel’s security cabinet made the safe return of residents to the north of the country an official goal of the war in Gaza.

Israel has repeatedly warned it could launch a military operation to drive Hezbollah away from the border.

UPDATE:  Unconfirmed reports suggest that Israel hacked communication devices held by Hezbollah members, causing their batteries to explode.

Explosions reportedly occurred in a southern suburb of Beirut known as Dahiyeh, according to Reuters news. NNA reported that “hacked” pager devices exploded in the towns of Ali Al-Nahri and Riyaq in Lebanon’s central Beqaa valley, resulting in a significant number of injuries. All three locations are Hezbollah strongholds.

The Israeli military, which has engaged in tit-for-tat strikes with Hezbollah since the start of the war in Gaza last October, said it would not be commenting on the incident.

Health workers across Lebanon were asked to report urgently to work given the “large number of injured people being transferred to hospitals” following the pager explosions, the Lebanese Ministry of Health said. Officials also called for people to donate blood in anticipation of increased need.

UPDATE: BEIRUT (AP) — A Hezbollah official tells The Associated Press that “several hundred” people, including members of the group, were wounded in different parts of Lebanon when their handheld pagers exploded.

He said a few Hezbollah fighters were also wounded in Syria when the pagers they were carrying exploded.

Dozens of people, including Iran’s ambassador, were wounded in Beirut’s suburbs and other parts of Lebanon after their handheld pagers exploded Tuesday, according to media reports and security officials. It wasn’t immediately clear if people were killed.

A senior military intelligence official and an official with a Lebanese group with knowledge of the situation, both of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said that pagers carried by Hezbollah members were detonated. The second official said it was believed to be an Israeli attack.

The Associated Press reached out to the Israeli military, which declined to comment.

Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency, close to the country’s powerful Revolutionary Guard, said on its Telegram channel that Mojtaba Amani, Iran’s ambassador in Lebanon, has a superficial injury and is under observation at a hospital. Meanwhile, another semi-official Mehr news agency, also on its Telegram channel reported that Amani was wounded by a pager explosion.

Photos and videos from Beirut’s southern suburbs circulating on social media and in local media showed people lying on the pavement with wounds on their hands or near their pants pockets.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah previously warned the group’s members not to carry cellphones, saying that they could be used by Israel to track their movements and to carry out targeted strikes.

Lebanon’s Health Ministry called on all hospitals to be on alert to take in emergency patients and for people who own pagers to get away from them. It also asked health workers to avoid using wireless devices.

AP photographers at area hospitals said the emergency rooms were overloaded with patients, many of them with injuries to their limbs, some in serious condition.

The state-run National News Agency said hospitals in southern Lebanon, the eastern Bekaa Valley and Beirut’s southern suburbs — all areas where Hezbollah has a strong presence — had called on people to donate blood of all types.

The news agency reported that in Beirut’s southern suburbs and other areas “the handheld pagers system was detonated using advanced technology, and dozens of injuries were reported.”

A Hezbollah official said that at least 150 people, including members of the group, were wounded in different parts of Lebanon when the pagers they were carrying exploded. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said the explosions were the result of “a security operation that targeted the devices.”

“The enemy (Israel) stands behind this security incident,” the official said, without elaborating. He added that the new pagers that Hezbollah members were carrying had lithium batteries that apparently exploded.

Lithium batteries, when overheated, can smoke, melt and even catch on fire. Rechargeable lithium batteries are used in consumer products ranging from cellphones and laptops to electric cars. Lithium battery fires can burn up to 590 C (1,100 F).

The incident comes at a time of heightened tensions between Lebanon and Israel. The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and Israeli forces have been clashing near-daily for more than 11 months against the backdrop of war between Israel and Hezbollah ally Hamas in Gaza.

The clashes have killed hundreds in Lebanon and dozens in Israel and displaced tens of thousands on both sides of the border. On Tuesday, Israel said that halting Hezbollah’s attacks in the north to allow residents to return to their homes is now an official war goal.
___

Abby Sewell and Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut, and Josef Federman, in Jerusalem, contributed to this report.

Photos credit various: 

BREAKING: Russia and US prisoner swap underway

Russia and the United States have agreed to swap prisoners in an extraordinary multipart deal, according to a senior Biden administration official.

The swap will allow the two wrongfully detained American citizens held by Moscow, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, to return home.

Gershkovich, 32, was arrested by Russian authorities in March 2023 for espionage, a charge he and U.S. officials flatly deny, with President Joe Biden saying Gershkovich was targeted for being a journalist and an American.

After an unusually hasty trial that played out behind closed doors, Gershkovich was found guilty and sentenced to 16 years in a high-security penal colony.

Whelan, who holds U.S., British, Irish and Canadian citizenship, was arrested in December 2018 while traveling on an American passport in Russia and also accused of espionage.

Both the Biden and Trump administrations denied the allegation against Whelan. He was convicted on the charges in June 2020 and sentenced to 16 years in prison, ultimately serving five.

The White House, State Department and CIA did not immediately return a request for comment.

When asked about the movement of Russian prisoners on Wednesday, State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said, "I don't want to speculate on any reasoning. What I can say is that the United States continues to be focused on working around the clock to work to get our wrongfully detained American citizens home. And that continues to be the case, but no updates beyond that."


Speaking earlier this month at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the administration was "determined" to make a deal happen for Americans in Russia.

"[W]e are determined to make it happen," he said on July 19 in response to a question about Gershkovich. "And I will consider it one of the most important things between now and the end of the year, and especially now at the end of the month, for us to try to get something done where we can get him home."

Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter, was taken into Russian custody while on assignment in Yekaterinburg March 2023. Russian authorities charged him with espionage, drawing immediate condemnation from the U.S. government, which determined Gershkovich to be wrongfully detained.

LIVE VIDEO LINK  

In July, Gershkovich was sentenced to 16 years in prison by a Russian court. The U.S. called his hurried trial "a sham."
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Secret Service Director resigns

By Maria Sacchetti,

Carol D. Leonnig,

Nick Miroff and

Shayna Jacobs

Washington Post 

Updated July 23, 2024 at 12:04 p.m. EDT|Published July 23, 2024 at 10:41 a.m. EDT

U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned Tuesday in the aftermath of the assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump in Pennsylvania, telling staff that she took “full responsibility,” according to a copy of a letter sent to agency staff obtained by The Washington Post.

“In light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to step down as your Director,” wrote Cheatle, who has been under intense pressure to resign from lawmakers of both parties.

“This incident does not define us,” Cheatle told staff. “I do not want my calls for resignation to be a distraction from the great work each and every one of you do towards our vital mission.”

The attack was the first against a U.S. leader on the elite protective agency’s watch in more than 40 years. Cheatle, a veteran Secret Service agent, had called the security failure involving a gunman shooting from an apparently unsecured roof at a Trump presidential campaign rally July 13 unacceptable and acknowledged that “the buck stops with me.”


She initially had said she would not resign and would cooperate with investigations into the shooting.


But during a House oversight hearing Monday, Cheatle faced withering scorn from Republicans and Democrats alike. Lawmakers took turns criticizing her for declining to answer detailed questions about what went wrong at the Trump rally.


Johnson calls Secret Service director resignation 'overdue'
1:42

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) on July 23 said Congress would need to rebuild "trust" in the Secret Service after Kimberly Cheatle resigned as director. (Video: The Washington Post)

After Cheatle’s resignation, Oversight committee chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) took credit for pushing her out and pledged “there will be more accountability to come.”

“Egregious security failures leading up to and at the Butler, Pennsylvania campaign rally resulted in the assassination attempt of President Trump, the murder of an innocent victim, and harm to others in the crowd,” Comer said in a statement. “We will continue our oversight of the Secret Service in support of the House Task Force to deliver transparency, accountability, and solutions to ensure this never happens again.”

READ THE REST HERE

CrowdStrike glitch exposes major vulnerability to Windows systems

VARIOUS SOURCES:


A failed tech update grounded flights throughout the country after US cybersecurity company CrowdStrike initiated a faulty software update. “This is not a security incident or cyberattack,” said CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz. “This is the first time in recent modern times we’ve seen something like this happen at this scale,” said New York City’s chief technology officer, Matthew Fraser. The graphic below is a 12 hour timelapse of Delta, American Airlines, and United flights as shared by
@US_Stormwatch.

In the state of Georgia, the Department of Driver Services said its computer systems were down at more than 60 offices statewide. The department was still giving road tests, but wasn’t issuing licenses to people who passed.

The Metropolitan Atlanta Regional Transit Authority said problems had caused service reductions on its rail system earlier in the morning, but that full rail service had been restored.

However, the system’s website, service information systems and online ticket sales remained disrupted.




Banks and health care providers saw their services disrupted and TV broadcasters went offline as businesses worldwide grappled with the ongoing outage. Air travel has been hit hard, too, with planes grounded and services delayed.


At the heart of the issue is Texas-based cybersecurity vendor CrowdStrike. On Friday, the cybersecurity firm experienced a major disruption following an issue with a software update.

CrowdStrike is what’s known as an “endpoint security” firm as it uses cloud technology to apply cyber protections to devices that are connected to the internet.

This differs from alternative approaches used by other cyber firms, which involve applying protection directly to backend server systems.

“Many companies use [CrowdStrike software] and install it on all of their machines across their organization,” Nick France, chief technology officer of IT security firm Sectigo, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Friday.

“So when an update happens that maybe has problems with it, it causes this problem where the machines reboot, and people can’t get back into their computers.”

CrowdStrike’s software requires deep access to a computer’s operating system to scan for threats. In the case of Friday’s outage, machines running Microsoft’s Windows operating system crashed due to a fault in the way a software update issued by CrowdStrike interacted with Windows.

“We have been made aware of an issue impacting Virtual Machines running Windows Client and Windows Server, running the CrowdStrike Falcon agent, which may encounter a bug check (BSOD [blue screen of death]) and get stuck in a restarting state. We approximate impact started around 19:00 UTC on the 18th of July,” Microsoft said in an update at 5:40 a.m. ET.

“We can confirm the affected update has been pulled by CrowdStrike. Customers that are continuing to experience issues should reach out to CrowdStrike for additional assistance,” the company added.

“The challenge here is that security software — because it’s doing its job to protect organizations — it has to have more privileged access to these machines,” he said.

So, while people may be seeing their IT issues as a problem with Windows, “it’s not actually a Windows issue, it’s related to a faulty or bad update from those security software,” Narang added.

CrowdStrike is “actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts,” CEO George Kurtz said Friday in a update on social media platform X. He added that Mac and Linux hosts are not affected.

“This is not a security incident or cyberattack. The issue has been identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed,” Kurtz said.

That fix could be hard to implement, though. Andy Grayland, chief information and security officer at threat intelligence firm Silobreaker, said that in order to implement a fix, engineers would have to go into each individual data center running windows.

They’d then have to log in, navigate to a certain CrowdStrike file, delete it, and then reboot the entire system, he said.

“Where machines are encrypted, complex encryption keys also need to be entered manually. Unless Microsoft and CrowdStrike (if they are involved) pull something miraculous out of the bag, this could be painful to recover from.”