The assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader and several senior Iranian military officials in February 2026 may mark a watershed moment in the evolution of modern warfare. The joint Israel and the USA operation to assassinate the Iranian’s top leadership was enabled by a sophisticated combination of surveillance technologies, communications interception, cyber capabilities, satellite imagery, human intelligence, and artificial intelligence-assisted analysis.
The Israel Mossad aided by the US’s CIA integrated information from multiple sources to create highly detailed profiles of senior Iranian officials, their routines, movements, and interactions. Advanced analytical systems transformed enormous volumes of raw information into actionable intelligence, identifying patterns and pinpointing locations with remarkable precision. The result was the reported targeting of a high-level leadership gathering in Tehran.
Only months earlier, the world witnessed another disturbing example of technology’s role in conflict. In September 2024, thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies exploded across Lebanon. Ordinary communication devices suddenly became instruments of death and destruction. Dozens were killed and thousands injured. The incident shocked the world because it demonstrated how civilian technology could allegedly be transformed into a weapon.
Taken together, the reported Tehran operation and the Lebanon device explosions reveal two dimensions of modern warfare. One demonstrates how surveillance systems, communications monitoring, artificial intelligence, and big-data analytics can allegedly be used to identify and locate targets. The other demonstrates how civilian technologies themselves can become part of military operations. This should concern every nation.
The explosions of pagers and walkie-talkies across Lebanon in September 2024 were not an ordinary military operation. They were a warning to the entire world. Devices normally used for communication suddenly became instruments of death. They exploded in pockets, homes, streets, hospitals and funeral gatherings. Dozens were killed, including children, and thousands were injured. Lebanon was thrown into panic because no one knew which device might explode next. This was the terrifying message of the attack: in the modern age, civilian technology itself can be turned into a battlefield.
The ability of Israel to weaponize civilian technological products points to a highly sophisticated operation involving deep intelligence penetration, supply-chain manipulation and remote activation. The explosive material is hidden inside the batteries of walkie-talkies, making detection extremely difficult. The United Nations human rights office warned that simultaneous targeting of thousands of people through such devices, without knowing who was carrying them or who was standing nearby, violated international human rights law and international humanitarian law.
This is where the matter becomes far larger than Hezbollah or Lebanon. If a pager, a phone, a radio or any communication device can be secretly converted into a bomb, then the distinction between civilian life and military operation begins to collapse. A device manufactured for communication becomes a weapon. A battery becomes an explosive chamber. A message becomes a trigger. A civilian street becomes an execution ground.
Israel has long projected itself as a global technology power. Its leaders have repeatedly celebrated the country’s innovation, cyber capability, intelligence reach, surveillance systems and big-data platforms. But Lebanon exposed the darker side of that technological power. Innovation, when fused with unchecked military ambition, does not merely produce security; it can produce assassination systems.
Israel’s history of targeted killings is well known. From letter bombs and explosive phones to drone strikes, cyber operations and remote-controlled weapons, Israel has used technology to hunt those it calls enemies. The killing of Hamas bombmaker Yahya Ayyash in 1996 through an explosive cellphone is one earlier example. The assassination of Iranian scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh through a remote-controlled, AI-assisted weapon is another. The Lebanon device explosions now add a more frightening dimension: mass deployment of weaponized civilian devices.
The danger is no longer limited to one individual target. The danger is mass assassination through ordinary technology. This development raises serious legal questions. International humanitarian law is built on the principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution. Combatants must be distinguished from civilians. Civilian objects must not be turned into indiscriminate weapons. Attacks must not cause civilian harm excessive to the military advantage sought. Commanders must take precautions to avoid killing innocent people. The Lebanon explosions appear to have endangered all these principles.
A device carried by one suspected fighter may explode in a market. A radio may detonate near a child. A pager may explode during a funeral. A walkie-talkie may injure doctors, shopkeepers or passersby. Such attacks cannot guarantee that only a lawful military target will be harmed. They spread fear across society. They make every electronic object suspicious. They turn normal civilian life into psychological warfare.
The same logic is visible in Gaza, where investigative reporting has raised grave concerns about AI-assisted targeting systems. The systems used to generate targets, identify suspected militants, monitor locations and accelerate bombing decisions.
When algorithms are fed with phone data, location signals, social networks, drone footage, facial recognition, banking records, traffic cameras and human intelligence, they can create a deadly profile of a person. But data is not the truth. Correlation is not guilt. A relative, driver, clerk, repairman, neighbor or political supporter can be wrongly treated as a combatant because his movements resemble someone else’s pattern. When such systems are used in war, a false match can become a death sentence.
The world cannot allow this to become normal. If Israel is permitted to weaponize civilian devices, infiltrate supply chains, manipulate batteries, exploit cloud systems, harvest civilian data and use AI to select targets, then every country is vulnerable. Today it is Lebanon. Tomorrow it can be Pakistan, Türkiye, Iran, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Oman, Kuwait or any other state that falls into the strategic path of a technologically superior adversary.
For Pakistan, the lesson is especially urgent. National security is no longer limited to tanks, aircraft, missiles and borders. It now includes phones, routers, servers, apps, satellites, cloud systems, databases, SIM cards and imported electronics. A country that does not control its digital infrastructure cannot fully protect its sovereignty. Pakistan must develop its own secure communication systems, independent cloud infrastructure, encryption capacity, chip research, cyber-defense institutions and national technology audit mechanisms.
Muslim countries must also act collectively. They should demand transparent supply-chain declarations for sensitive communication and electronic equipment. They should require companies to disclose whether products, software, designs, components or data services have links to Israeli military or intelligence institutions. They should build joint research and development platforms, invest in indigenous technology and reduce dependence on foreign systems that may contain hidden vulnerabilities.
At the United Nations, Muslim countries and other concerned states should jointly move a resolution against the weaponization of civilian technology. The resolution should prohibit the conversion of civilian communication devices into explosive weapons, restrict the use of mass surveillance for extrajudicial assassination, demand human accountability in AI-assisted targeting and call for international inspection standards for critical communication equipment.
This is not merely a Muslim issue. It is a global issue. If ordinary electronics can be transformed into secret weapons, then no society is safe. If civilian data can be converted into kill lists, then no privacy is safe. If AI can accelerate assassination without transparent accountability, then international law itself is in danger.
The world must draw a clear line: civilian technology must remain civilian. Communication devices must not become bombs. Data systems must not become assassination factories. Artificial intelligence must not become a license to kill.
Israel’s alleged use of civilian technology in Lebanon has exposed a terrifying future. The question now is whether the world will stop that future before it becomes the new normal.
