Security establishment shocked Netanyahu spilled secret details of pager op – report
PM regales conference audience with details on how Israel bombed Hezbollah scanner, killed its operator, to prevent explosive beepers being checked after terror group became suspicious
Lazar Berman is The Times of Israel's diplomatic reporter
The security establishment was stunned to hear Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reveal classified details of the September 2024 pager and walkie-talkie operation against Hezbollah in a speech this week, according to a Monday evening report.
On September 17, thousands of pagers used by Hezbollah operatives across Lebanon suddenly began to explode, injuring those holding them and killing over two dozen. A day later, hundreds of walkie-talkies also blew up, injuring or killing scores more. Israel had concealed small explosives inside the devices before they were delivered to Hezbollah, as a weapon ready to be deployed at any time.
It was a decisive development in an escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah that began in the wake of the devastating Hamas-led invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023.
Speaking at a Jewish News Syndicate conference Sunday evening, Netanyahu said that Israel bombed a scanning machine that Iran sent to Lebanon once Hezbollah suspected that its pagers were booby-trapped, and took out its operator as well.
“We learned that Hezbollah had sent three beepers to be scanned in Iran; we had previously bombed the scanner they were going to bring in, so we got rid of that, and the guy who operates it,” he said.
Those details had been censored repeatedly because they would expose intelligence sources and thus harm national security, Channel 12 reported.
ISRAEL: PM Netanyahu revealed he launched the operation against Hezbollah’s beepers after learning they were sending some to Iran for inspection. When told Iran would find the devices rigged within a day, he ordered immediate activation. pic.twitter.com/XR9qGMLTF3
— KolHaolam (@KolHaolam) April 28, 2025
As a result of the incidents he described, a decision was made to activate the pagers rather than wait any longer, Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu also said that the planned IDF ground incursion into Lebanon was brought forward by three weeks because the pager operation was carried out at short notice.
As prime minister, Netanyahu can legally reveal heretofore classified material, but this is usually done in consultation with the security services to ensure that no harm will come from the revelation. No such coordination was made this time, Channel 12 reported.
At the conference, Netanyahu said he refused to inform Washington in advance of the pager operation against Hezbollah because he assumed it would be leaked.
“I don’t read The New York Times that often, but why give them the advance? It would be on the net,” he said.
The reported discomfort in the security establishment over Netanyahu’s remarks about the pagers came with the Prime Minister’s Office already embroiled in a scandal over leaked classified documents.
Eli Feldstein, a Netanyahu spokesperson, was charged in November with harming national security in a case involving the theft and leaking of material from a classified IDF document to the German daily Bild to sway public opinion toward Netanyahu.
Feldstein is also involved, along with two other close Netanyahu aides, in the so-called Qatargate affair, in which they are suspected of multiple offenses tied to their alleged work for a pro-Qatar lobbying firm, including contact with a foreign agent and a series of corruption charges involving lobbyists and businessmen.
The Times of Israel Community.