BAZOURIEH: Her head heavy with a cold, Sarah Jaffal woke up late and shuffled into the kitchen. The silence of the apartment was pierced by the unfamiliar buzzing of a pager lying near a table. Annoyed but curious, the 21-year-old picked up the device belonging to a family member. She saw a message: “Error,” then “Press OK.” Jaffal didn’t have time to respond. She didn't even hear the explosion. “Suddenly everything went dark,” she said. “I felt I was in a whirlpool.” She was in and out of consciousness for hours, blood streaming from her mouth, excruciating pain in her fingertips.

BAZOURIEH: Her head heavy with a cold, Sarah Jaffal woke up late and shuffled into the kitchen. The silence of the apartment was pierced by the unfamiliar buzzing of a pager lying…

Thousands of pagers distributed to the militant group Hezbollah exploded across Lebanon on 17 September 2024. Hussein Dheini was playing at home in southern Lebanon when an…