The Ring of Fire

A day after a shocking attack that caused thousands of Hezbollah pagers to explode, a similar attack targeted walkie-talkies used by the group in Lebanon. Here’s the latest from CNN.

+ “It was a use it or lose it moment.” According to some reporting, Israel conducted Lebanon pager attack when they did fearing Hezbollah was onto the operation.

+ “A certain type of spy operation is known as a ‘hand of God,’ because to its victims it seems to come with such sudden and precise violence that it may as well have been a thunderbolt … It is unsettling enough to know that your enemy found his way into the front pocket of your skinny jeans. It is even worse to know that he has been there for five months.” Graeme Wood in The Atlantic (Gift Article): Israel’s ‘Hand of God’ Operation.

+ NY Mag: What experts say about the unprecedented strike.

+ Eliot A. Cohen in The Atlantic (Gift Article): “The question, as always, is: To what strategic effect? How will this act of violence, however spectacular, shape the ongoing war between Israel, Hezbollah, and Iran? It might very well lead to the cataclysmic battle that many have warned against, as Hezbollah rains down tens of thousands of rockets on Israeli cities while Israeli armored divisions plunge into Lebanon, causing hundreds of thousands, or even millions, to flee northward. The ensuing destruction and the civilian death toll might be immense. Or it might not.” (And there you have it.)