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Incorrect. The reports are 42 total killed, 12 civilians including 2 children. "Operation Grim Beeper" (seriously) on Wikipedia cites these numbers from Lebane

• dralley 9mo ago
  Fair enough, 12 total only includes the original pager attack, not the subsequent radio one. However, you seem to have made the same mistake. 42 people were killed total, but that does not mean that there were 42 targets. In any case, if Hezbollah themselves admit that 1500 of their fighters were injured by the attack (according to your own source), it seems extremely dishonest to claim that all 4000 were civilians or that there were only 42 targets.
  • ada1981 9mo ago
    I didn't say 42 targets. Per the report: 42 dead, 12 of which were civilians. It follows that 30 were considered Hezbollah.
    • dralley 9mo ago
      Several of those initially claimed to be civilians were later acknowledged by Hezbollah, so that number is still a bit fuzzy.
      • ada1981 9mo ago
        I'm not claiming absolute knowledge of numbers, just going off the public reports which are all we can go on.
      • j_maffe 9mo ago
        Source? Can't find anything stating this
    • ada1981 9mo ago
      The report is 4,000 civilians injured (which means they just didn't die -- people lost fingers, limbs, eyes, etc.) Presumably if you have thousands of Hezbola people walking around within their homes, businesses, hopistals, shops, etc. it makes sense you'd have many civilian injuries when these went off. There wasn't a geo fence around them and if someone was in an NICU or preschool the explosions were indiscriminate. So while there was some element of precision in placement of who had these pagers, there was zero awareness (by design) to where they actually were when they all exploded.
      • breppp 9mo ago
        but we have the benefit of seeing live videos from actual shops where these hezbollah members were, and you can see the explosion was small enough to not hurt anyone in the vicinity even if very close, one of the videos shows a supermarket line, and no one around is hurt
      • mlyle 9mo ago
        I haven't seen a report of 4000 civilians injured. I have seen a report of 4000 people injured across the two attacks, but presumably some fraction of these are targets. 42 killed, of whom Hezbollah said 12 were civilians (later admitting some of the 12 were fighters). Historical average is about half of the wounded or killed in conflicts to be civilians. < 12/42 would be a relatively "good" ratio.
        • tw04 9mo ago
          You didn’t see 4,000 because you didn’t look for it. It’s literally in the wikipedia article linked in the thread you’re responding to with multiple associated citations.
          • neoromantique 9mo ago
            The distinction is /civilians/. You make an assumption that of the 4000 people wounded /all/ were civilians, which is odd, considering that explosive was in a device given out to Hezbollah members.
    • neoromantique 9mo ago
      >I didn't say 42 targets. You quite literally did.
      • ada1981 9mo ago
        What? It's possible I had a previous typo, but please show me where I said that.
      • ada1981 9mo ago
        ??
        • neoromantique 9mo ago
          Sorry, I don't always check responses. I checked and it was a mixup, I assumed you were the original poster(tw04). I stand corrected.
          • ada1981 9mo ago
            Appreciate the follow up and retraction. Thanks!
  • tw04 9mo ago
    >42 people were killed total, but that does not mean that there were 42 targets. So they only managed to hit 30 targets with 12 misfires… that makes it even worse. > In any case, if Hezbollah themselves admit that 1500 of their fighters were injured by the attack (according to your own source) That’s 1500 in addition to the 4,000 civilians. The fact they managed to wound 2.5x+ as many civilians as targets isn’t exactly making them look better…
• tptacek 9mo ago
  The figure of merit in a military strike is casualties, not KIA; it's the "wounded" part you actually care about (in fact, in some tactical situations, wounding is preferable to killing, as it ties up adversary logistical resources). Since the pagers that were targeted were exclusively used by Hezbollah (which fought an actual civil war with the Lebanese security forces specifically in order to establish its own telecom network), I would be extraordinarily wary of any source that has claimed more injuries to noncombatants than to combatants. You can still tell a story where the pager attack was unacceptable owing to civilian casualties: there could be so many civilian casualties that any number of combatant casualties wouldn't justify it. But if you're claiming that there were more casualties to noncombatants over small explosions from devices carried principally in the pockets of combatants, it is rational to draw the conclusion that your reasoning (and sourcing) is motivated.
  • iberator 9mo ago
    Hezbollah is a legal political party in Lebanon. This is an important detail buddy.
    • tptacek 9mo ago
      No, it isn't. Hezbollah is an occupying military force in Lebanon, responsive only to a minority of its population, that happens to have a political party attached. It is the IRGC's faction of the Lebanese Parliament, except to the extent that it operates its own parallel government when that body is inconvenient to it.
  • oa335 9mo ago
    > it is rational to draw the conclusion that your reasoning (and sourcing) is motivated. Have you provided any sources at all for you numerous claims throughout this thread? Would it also me rational to draw a the conclusion that someone who has provided no sources at all is also engaging in “motivated reasoning”? At least be consistent.
    • tptacek 9mo ago