step one: mossad sets up some sham manufacturing facility in Hungary or buys an existing one.

Step 2: reach out to gold apollo and make a deal to produce their pagers under license. Money no object they probably offered them very good terms. Gold apollo is so pleased by the money being offered they fail to investigate the company properly. Step 3: mossad agents start production introducing lethal batteries into the design, produce several thousand units then vanish leaving apollo executives bewildered but they have the money already so they don't ask too many questions.

Step 4: sell all the pagers at a great price to some hezbolla arms dealer, go home, buy some popcorn and turn on the tv.

In short everyone involved have probably disappeared months ago.

Also a really clever part is that they could have turned a profit on the sale meaning the operation was at least partly subsidised by hezbolla themselves.

Would not surprise me if this turned out to be something like that.

I don't know why the authorities are ignoring them but it's probably such a big can of worms that everyones afraid to open it.

In all seriousness though, those “sweet shops” and “Thai massage parlours” and the like are clearly fronts for money laundering. I doubt they’re being ignored, but as you say, there’s probably some reason no one’s dealt with them yet.

Were the pagers military grade? Hungarian company providing military equipment to Hezbollah would be a scandal on its own.

The EU now needs to do something about it, and do it fast. Or to pretend that nothing happened, surrender to Israel, create a dangerous exception "for the cause" and send a clear message that EU manufacture laws are a joke. All those security filters painfully raised around EU products worth zero and can be easily jumped over. This is a really bad message for all the EU makers.

A franchise of your brand also signed a contract to make your product. I assume that changing the functionality or specifications of your registered product is strictly forbidden in that contract. I bet that this move violated some laws on Taiwan also.

If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo I would be fuming and furious at this moment.

Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge; also destroyed the brand image and painted a target in the backs of each employee and reseller of Gold Apollo.

At this moment, nothing suggest that the Taiwan based company were part of this. They should apologize, clear things, and detach themselves from this PR mess as soon as possible.

I understand that from the Mossad point of view this can be a big success, but from the point of view of the companies that try to sell their legit products, this is an direct attack.

Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah? It seems like they were already in the war as a supplier of goods to a terrorist organization.

I wonder if this is why Israel made this move because the manufacturer was already breaking international sanction by supplying Hezbollah so they have little recourse.

If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo, I’d be investigating why my franchisee was selling stuff to Hezbollah in the first place.

But it’s beepers and only 5,000. How expensive is this at the end of the day? It’s probably the last time a company lends then brand name for a small amount.

Apollo pagers are everywhere and sold through resellers through out the world, even in the US. Let’s not do Hasbara-style speculation

Selling pagers to Lebanon citizens is legal if I'm not wrong.

Not necessarily. At this moment, all suggests that somebody (Ehem, Mossad) was impersonating a reseller of the brand [1]. How do they knew that the buyers were from Hezbollah?. Did the buyers wear a t-shirt?. What if somebody was buying it to resell it later and bank some profit?. This stuff could ended being sold to innocent people, or distributed by all the schools of Lebanon.

[1] New facts can change this picture and I may be wrong about this.

> If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo, I’d be investigating why my franchisee was selling stuff to Hezbollah in the first place.

Agree. Definitely, the maker should make a move about that, just to be sure. And to be very transparent about that investigation.

This is true. But only the thousands of Hezbollah pagers blew up, right? There are a lot of details needed to see if they knowingly supplied Hezbollah or just sold a big batch to a random customer. I assumed, perhaps falsely, that a 5000 pager order for Lebanon is pretty specific and does anyone really use pagers any more? My thinking was that this is a specific tech used by Hezbollah. Although it is a consumer tech, maybe pagers are super popular in Lebanon. But 3000 people were injured so I thought that the vast majority of these pagers were used exclusively by Hezbollah.

My point is their stuff was already in a war. Israel making them explode doesn’t seem to change that.

After ABC news, "an AP photographer in the city of Sidon saw a mobile phone shop damaged after devices exploded inside".

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/gold-apollo-p...

Hopefully! Just out of curiosity I had a look for that brand of pager on eBay, but didn't see any. I'd hate to think that there were a few rogue units out there that had potential to cause harm!

I don't have info about those specific models, but this is pagers and not rockets. If someone makes an order for 5000 units I can't image you'd have an expectation to do a background check with references.

It's basically like ordering 5000 units of Raspberry Pi, would you consider that a military export?

There is a federal Office of Anti boycott Compliance that any employee of any company can tip off and have the company punished if it's believed they did not give a fair shake to an Israeli supplier or bidder of any kind.

For products that can have dual-use capabilities, you need an export license that is given per customer (at least in the EU) where some due diligence is performed. If the company is a reseller in Lebanon and there are no export bans for that country, they can be sold/bought without an issue.

The fact that somewhere in transit they were modified, the manufacturer or seller cannot be held liable for it.

Sanctions violations are very much a "do not pass go" style crime, and this looks like it was an entire batch that was delivered directly to Hezbollah.

I don't mean to be "that guy", but "military grade" means nothing nowadays. It can mean anything from "made to exactly standards" to "made by the lowest bidder, and likely to fail the minute it's used".

* There's a small consulting company called BAC after the initials of the founder Bársony-Arcidiacono Cristiana. One of their services is https://archive.fo/kwTKA "We develop international technology cooperation among countries for the sale of telecommunication products. This cooperation entails scaling up a business from Asia to new markets e.g. developing countries". Their home page https://archive.fo/dXtMx lists these: Strategic Advisor for major International Organizations including Financial companies (Venture Capitals, IAEA, UNESCO, CNRS, EC, etc.). Business Developer and Savvy Analyst for Innovative/ Solutions in diverse fields (Sustainable Development (SDGs), Water, Energy, Resilience-Mitigation-Adaptation, Capacity Building, Complex Emergencies, Digitalization (AI, Blockchain, ICT) within Humanistic Economy.

* The official place of business is just a business "placeholder". The woman who answered the doorbell for journalists said no one ever from BAC is there, maybe once a month a mail comes which she receives.

* This house is also the registered address for a number of companies. Two companies have Russian owners. One of them is an oil wholesaler.

* BAC revenue in 2023 was 210 million forints and 13 million profit. What's remarkable is how person-related expenses (payroll etc) was a mere 0.5 million forints for the entire year. Hungarian monthly minimum wage was a bit over 0.25M HUF. One million HUF is about 2820 USD.

* NBC talked to the founder. According to her "I don’t make the pagers. I am just the intermediate. I think you got it wrong". https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-firm-denies-making...

* The founder's linkedin is still up https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidiaco... Her PhD from 2006 is at https://ucl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?do... so it seems real.

https://hvg.hu/kkv/20240918_hezbollah-bac-consulting

https://archive.is/QWlXw

https://telex.hu/belfold/2024/09/18/mit-lehet-tudni-a-magyar...

In conclusion, if I needed to speculate based on the LinkedIn page and the archived consulting page, what gives me pause: if this woman indeed exists she is one of the most talented people in all of Hungary. Seven languages, degrees in diverse fields and a PhD in physics. At the same time, I have indeed found a PhD from 2006 and her grants and scholarships from even earlier are probably not hard to verify either. I do not know what to think.

As it's written, it only mentions "a business" (singular) when it likely means multiple businesses. It also uses the word cooperation, which has different connotations than a partnership. Typically, business will say that they "cooperate" with governments, standards bodies, or trade restrictions. For friendly and mutually profitable agreements, they'll use the word "partner" to indicate that both parties benefit.

The timeline of web archive snapshots is strange. No real change or activity for years - then a flurry of changes in 2024.

Also, https://web.archive.org/web/20211210194900/https://www.bacco... this is interesting, it's 2021 Dec and yet, it has AI on the front page.

I'm hopeful that this won't escalate, but I'm very anxious that it will.

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidi...

She also regularly reposts antivaxx posts.

Which does not really mesh with her supposed education level.

Weird.

Since when terrorists need excuses?

>and the conflict could escalate.

Like they could start daily launching rockets into Israel? Or football fields with children? They are already doing that.

I have an intuition that the grandparent tried to express someting like:

Now Hezbollah has a motivation to attack Hungarian interest in the EU.

Which I'd simplify as something more concerning for me, as a Hungarian: Now Hazbollah has motivation to attack Hungarians.

You might not enjoy this, but Hezbollah are classified as a terror organisation by the EU and the Arab League; the IDF have certainly acted deplorably in many scenarios and the situation with Israel is tense, however they are classified as a legitimate sovereign military, they wear military uniforms as would be expected by the Geneva conventions and identify themselves.

I think "needing an excuse" flies out the window when we're discussing the most sophisticated, targeted attack ever conducted in any kind of warfare.

Attacking senior leadership of an organisation that is a threat to your existence, has been carpet bombing sections of your country, does not identify itself as an active military via uniforms and hides in the population- while simultaneously minimising civilian casualties to 1-- is pretty much the definition of "reason" and "restraint".

Lest not forget that these devices were hand-delivered to terrorists, it's about as targeted as it gets.

This is definitely not the hill to die on when discussing Israels crimes.

EDIT: Downvoting without commenting? You know you have indefensible positions, cowards.

That is not true. Lots of countries and organizations consider them a terrorist organization, but the UN isn’t one of them.

> As of October 2020, Hezbollah or its military wing are considered terrorist organizations by at least 26 countries, as well as by the European Union and since 2017 by most member states of the Arab League, with the exception of Iraq and Lebanon, where Hezbollah is the most powerful political party.[374]

> The countries that have designated Hezbollah a terrorist organization include: the Gulf Cooperation Council,[375] and their members Saudi Arabia,[376] Bahrain,[377] United Arab Emirates,[376] as well as Argentina,[378] Canada,[379] Colombia,[380] Estonia,[381] Germany,[382] Honduras,[383] Israel,[384] Kosovo,[385] Lithuania,[386] Malaysia,[387] Paraguay,[388] Serbia,[381] Slovenia,[389] United Kingdom,[390] United States,[391] and Guatemala.[392]

Or is your statement that the people targeted were not military? Or... what's your point with this comment?

[0]: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule65

I'll tell you now: I'm becoming more radicalised the more I see the absolute state of discourse here; it's not only polarised: it's completely asymmetric.

It seems that it's not even possible for people to consider that the Islamic side has a part to play in what is happening, and to condemn both parties for the actions that they take, understanding that it's not equivalent in all areas.

This statement doesn't make a lot of sense. Israel is an ally we supply with munitions and the other side is acknowledged to be a terrorist militia and therefore we support their destruction. Of course we expect Israel to adhere to a much higher standard than Hezbollah, right?

I think (hope) you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who believes Hezbollah members shouldn't be held accountable for violations of the law of armed conflict. It's just that nobody believes the problem of Hezbollah is going to be solved in a court or with diplomacy at this stage.

> the Islamic side

If you feel the need to worry about the religious angle you really ought to differentiate between Sunni and Shia when talking about Lebanon in particular, given the unique characteristics of their demography and politics. Although I don't know where you're going with that.

> I'm becoming more radicalised

Fantastic.

If you look at it binary then both sides committed atrocities, war crimes, and generally acts of terror. If you look at the magnitude though one stands out.

> the Islamic side has a part to play in what is happening

Attempts to defend either are weak, nether is defensible really. But defending the side that took it orders of magnitude further with explanations like well the other side "had a part" are absolutely gross and reminiscent of explanations for certain atrocities a certain European country committed 80 years ago because "they" knew what they did to deserve it right? "They" also had a part to play.

But I think we disagree on a core tenet: that magnitude is a precursor to understanding who belligerents are.

If that was the case then during all history, the winning side would always have to be the bad guy, no matter who initiated hostilities or how warfare was conducted.

I will never recover.

Separately, I do think it's funny when people try to justify Israel's actions by reference to international laws or norms, as if Israel cares. They would still have done this even if they were the only country in the world that considered Hezbollah a terrorist organization.

Just like they're (practically) the only country in the world that considers the Golan Heights or East Jerusalem to be legitimately part of their territory, their occupation of the West Bank to be legal, their permanent air and sea blockade of the Gaza Strip to be legal, and so on. They don't appear to care about international norms at all.

It's a very solid defense to say "well, if we're being attacked by a non-military force that breaks the rules, then what choice do we have".

If they were being attacked by a military force that followed the Geneva conventions it would be easier to drum up anti-Israel support internationally for an intervention.

So, sorry to say it; but it's a fair criticism to say that one side is even more flagrant of the rules: why should Israel even bother trying to abide them?

Here I am to condemn it, I have even written to my MEP regarding that topic.

Thats why we sanction Russia and Iran.

Israel needs to be friendly with the west because it is surrounded by hostile nations. But those nations are making things harder for the rest of the world to intervene.

EU does not classify Hezbollah as a terror organisation, only its military wing.

My understanding was that it was exclusively military leaders and that the pagers were handed out specifically to combat Israeli surveillance.

So nasty but effective. I think Israel should at least get some credit for minimising the risk of innocent bystanders getting injured. They could have made a bigger bomb.

Europe only care for geopolitical games in the Mediterranean and petroleum. The Gaza conflict has shown that oil is on its way out as a top level geopolitical influence.

Lol military grade. This is a guerilla fighting group getting leftover oil money from Iran. They were using pagers.

Israel has been fighting for 100 years with its hands tied. With the unofficial and largely official sunni/saudi Israel alliance, only Iran cares about the freedom fighters of Gaza and Lebanon, and you can put a ten year clock on that funding once EVs start taking real chunks of transport

Would Toyota or any other car manufacturer sue Arabs et al. for turning their pickups into rolling suicide bombs?

If the owner wants later to trow their Toyota over a cliff is a different problem and not Toyota's business.

I don't think that would make a difference at all, explosives could be disguised in any electronic components, being transparent wouldn't help very much. The Taiwanese company's brand is now irreparably tarnished, I think that is the cost of lending the brand name to an untrustworthy partner.

(I don’t mean “can the sue me” but “do they have any chance of winning” of course)

In this case there would also be a contract with specific terms for the reseller/manufacturer that certainly includes language such as "purposefully produce devices that would damage the brand".

Of course I think the customers have a more serious case to bring on (particularly ones that weren't terrorists). As well as war crime considerations.

For Gold Apollo the dilemma here is either to sue the Israel Government (and try to survive the experience as company), or to take the piss and be sued for the families of the people mutilated by "their" product. They are in a difficult position.

It depends on how deep are their pockets and what they think will do less damage to the brand. Also if it has Taiwanese government support or not (unlikely as they probably depend on Israel technology for defense); and if Taiwan companies team with them or not. If the "made in Taiwan" sector want to keep selling radios and pagers to the rest of the planet they need to assure that this can't happen again.

I assume that the consequences for Israel will be indirect, limited and approved by USA, or none.