Weaponising ‘apparently harmless portable objects’: emerging categorisations of trust and risk in post ‘pager attacks’ Lebanon

Tobias Boelt Back

Small Wars and Insurgencies, 2025, vol. 36, issue 6, 1025-1048

Abstract: The September 2024 ‘pager attacks’ in Lebanon and Syria marked a new modus operandi of remote warfare: The achievement of military objectives through covert mass weaponisation of seemingly harmless objects. Analysing brief interviews conducted in the hours and days after the attacks in the streets of Lebanon, I focalise the formation and enactment of new, socially sanctionable practices for engaging with suddenly potentially lethal consumer technology. My paper shows that the impact of the attacks extended well beyond the target devices and immediate casualties, causing a spillover effect of distrust from targeted devices to electronic devices more broadly.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/09592318.2025.2507223

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