ISRAEL has launched another elaborate tech blitz in Lebanon with leaflets containing a “dangerous barcode”, Hezbollah claims.
The reported cyber strike comes a week after Mossad’s shock pager strike against the terror group left them in “chaos”.
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The Israeli Defence Force has now dropped thousands of leaflets into Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley as it pummels the country with airstrikes.
Each of the leaflets contains a QR code that says it will take locals to a safe area – but Hezbollah doesn’t believe the cipher.
Hezbollah’s media office said Tuesday the leaflets were “very dangerous” and warned scanning the code would “withdraw all information” from any device.
The note claims the code will take the scanner to a map of an area that it is safe to move to away from the strikes.
A translation of the Arabic declares the leaflet an “urgent warning”.
It reads: “Hezbollah activity forces the IDF to move against military positions in the village and the IDF does not want to harm you.
“If you are in a building that contains Hezbollah weapons, you must leave the village within two hours and move 1,000 metres away or to the nearest central school and do not return until you receive a message.
“Anyone who is near Hezbollah elements, facilities or weapons he puts his life and he lives of his family at risk.”
It then instructs readers with the QR code to “Scan the QR code to reveal the block map”.
Late Tuesday afternoon the IDF announced it had begun an “extensive wave” of attacks on “terrorist targets” in Lebanon.
The IDF said it hit 1,600 targets across Lebanon on Monday – the deadliest barrage since the 2006 war against Hezbollah, the Times of Israel reported.
At least 558 people have been killed, including dozens of children, and at least 1,835 injured, the Lebanese health ministry said.
Israel has wiped out much of the terror group’s leadership in targeted strikes, including Ibrahim Aqil who was killed in an IDF blast on southern Beirut on Friday.
On Tuesday, leading commander Ibrahim Qubaisi in the group’s rocket division was killed in the suburbs of Beirut, Reuters reported.
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Israel also warned civilians through hacked radio broadcasts, text messages, and phone calls about the strikes – giving them two hours to flee.
Ten of thousands of residents fled from the south in desperate search of shelter as Israel pounded targets with airstrikes.
The main highway out of the southern port city of Sidon was jammed with cars heading toward Beirut in a staggering mass exodus.
Hezbollah has launched hundreds of rockets back at Israel, with 300 rockets fired just last night, local media reported.
Fears of an all-out war in the region have been stoked by the escalation – with Lebanon still reeling from two deadly attacks on communication devices last week.
Booby-trapped devices blew up simultaneously across the Middle Eastern country in sabotaged pager and walkie-talkie strikes.
Thousands were injured across the two hits which left victims with missing eyes, fingers, and chunks blown out of legs.
Iran hit back and accused Israel of “mass murder”, describing last Tuesday’s surprise pager attack as “terrorism”.
Tehran’s ambassador lost an eye and was been flown back to the country for treatment.
The IDF used leaflets when it wanted people to move in Gaza as its tanks and soldiers sought to wipe out Hamas.
It dropped over one million of the pieces of paper into Gaza in November as it told locals to flee the battlefield.
Israel Defence Forces chiefs claimed at the time the drop shows they are trying to limit civilian casualties but tens of thousands of innocent people were still killed, according to authorities.
Pager and walkie-talkie strike
The spike in fighting follows the coordinated pager and walkie-talkie blitz last week with Israel sabotaging communications devices.
The attacks were aimed at Hezbollah and hit the terror group’s fighters and civilians in Lebanon and Syria.
The strikes, which hit Tuesday and Wednesday last week, killed at least 39 and left thousands more injured.
Doctors in Lebanon have been overwhelmed by casualties after two waves of blasts – with many left blinded.
Skilled physicians say they have never had to surgically remove more eyes before as Hezbollah’s boss labelled the strikes a possible “declaration of war” from Israel.
One of those injured was the Iranian envoy to the country who has reportedly lost an eye.
Hezbollah’s boss Hassan Nasrallah said the group intends to seek revenge for the attacks that “crossed over all the red lines” and will not stop until the war in Gaza ends.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said he “condemned the terrorist act of the Zionist regime… as an example of mass murder”.
Israel reportedly planted the explosives inside the pagers in a years’ long operation that involved firms in Taiwan and Hungary.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps has ordered all members to stop using any types of communication devices, Reuters reports.
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