The Mossad began introducing radios with explosives into Lebanon from 2015. The two-way radios contained large battery packs, hidden explosives and a transmission system that gave Israel full access to Hezbollah's communications.

The Israelis listened to Hezbollah for nine years while maintaining the possibility of converting radios into bombs in the future. It was not revealed how many radios were sold to Hezbollah or how Hezbollah was convinced to purchase them.

The idea for Operation Pager arose in 2022, after the success of a two-way radio project, according to Israeli, Middle Eastern and American officials who spoke to The Washington Post.

Wiretaps revealed that Hezbollah was looking for pagers to transmit orders to mid- and low-level operatives instead of traceable cell phones. In Hezbollah's initial sales proposal two years ago, a new line of "Apollo" devices manufactured by a Taiwanese company was proposed.

The sales proposal came from a woman, a former sales representative in the Middle East of the Taiwanese company, who founded her own company and received a license to sell a variety of "Apollo" branded summons. Sometime in 2023, she offered Hezbollah a deal on one of the products her company sells: the durable and reliable AR924.

Compared to the original model from Apollo, the AR924 pager presented to Hezbollah was a bit bulky with an oversized battery that could run for months without charging. Hezbollah believed that there was no risk that the Israeli intelligence services would be able to track the pagers. Hezbollah commanders were so impressed with these devices that they purchased 5,000 of them and began distributing them to mid-level fighters and support personnel in February 2024.

The fake pager AR924 was assembled in Israel. The bomb component was carefully hidden so that it would be almost impossible to identify it even if the device was disassembled.

Israeli officials believe Hezbollah dismantled some of the pagers and may have x-rayed them to allay suspicions.

The Mossad was able to remotely access the devices and detonate them upon receiving the signal. But to ensure that only Hezbollah were killed and injured, the explosion could only be triggered by pressing two buttons to get a "coded message" flashed on the screen and that was what triggered the explosions on September 17th.

Thanks to the walkie-talkies and the pager, the Mossad knew the exact movements of Hezbollah operatives and was able to deliver bombs to specific locations.