I was reading about the bombing of PanAm Flight 103 (aka the Lockerbie bombing) the other day.

Apparently, agents of the Libyan intelligence service planted a bomb hidden in a consumer electronic device (cassette player) onboard the aircraft which was remotely detonated, most likely through a timing mechanism.

Onboard were several US government and Intelligence officials including the CIA's deputy station chief in Beirut.

So, I guess if we were to apply the sort of logic and sentiments expressed in this article, the Lockerbie bombing too was a clever use of explosives hidden in consumer electronic devices to eliminate high-value military and intelligence assets of an adversary.

The fact that civilians were harmed was tragic, but a result of the American practice of embedding high-value intelligence assets within civilian infrastructure and populations.

If the Americans had more concern for their citizens, they would have chartered a separate flight for the CIA agents, so as not to put the civilians around them at risk. Instead, the US chose to embed them on civilian, commercial flights.

Now obviously, this is horse crap, but so too is the ridiculous notion that we should somehow be cheering for Israel intelligence resorting to the kinds of tactics taken from the playbook of Moammar Qadaffi's intelligence service.

Interestingly, Qadaffi accepted responsibility for the bombing and eventually paid out over a billion dollars in compensation to the families of the victims.

I'm not sure Israel has officially acknowledged its role (it rarely does in operations such as this) though it is widely understood to be Israeli intelligence that carried it out. I also doubt Israel is going to compensate the families of the children, doctors, and other civilian bystanders that were injured or killed any time soon. At least I'm not holding my breath.

This does seem to be legal grey area with experts divided on whether it was legal or not under various international laws and statues. A more nuanced discussion on this is offered by the Lieber Institute at WestPoint.

https://lieber.westpoint.edu/well-it-depends-explosive-pagers-attack-revisited/

However, when a country that goes to great pains to convince the world that it is a legitimate, Western country with Western values is employing the tactics of Moammar Qaddafi, I think that's very bad optics.

Plus, it has fueled all kinds of jokes about the danger of buying exploding Israeli goods, which I'm sure is frustrating to the Israeli medical device industry. What other supply chain attacks are underway? Could my pacemaker have gotten mixed up with one intended for a Hezbollah recipient? Who's to know.

The BDS movement is likely having a field day with this. Israel keeps providing the best propaganda against itself than its enemies could ever devise.