Al-Monitor's Gabrielle Debinski and Tyler Huffman report on why Israeli officials, choosing between three options, made a decision on Tuesday to detonate pagers used by Hezbollah operatives. The pager attacks killed at least 12 people, including two children, and left around 2,800 others injured. On Wednesday more explosions followed as hand-held radios detonated, killing at least 20 people and injuring more than 450, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry.

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Israel is suspected of being behind a large-scale attack on pagers used by Hezbollah members that exploded across Lebanon on Tuesday, Ali Hashem, a contributor in the region gives us the regional first reaction and mood on the ground.

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In Washington, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid called Monday for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to seal a Gaza truce deal while Israel's defense minister, Yoav Gallant, met with US envoy Amos Hochstein. Gallant warned that the possibility for an agreement with Hezbollah is becoming less likely as the group "continues to tie itself" to Hamas.

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Al-Monitor's Adam Lucente discusses Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian's first foreign trip this week to Iraq, where he called for unity against Israel and met with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani in Baghdad as well as Kurdistan Region President Masoud Barzani in Erbil.

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Russia has received short-range ballistic missiles from Iran and is expected to use them on the Ukrainian battlefield within weeks, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Tuesday, a claim Tehran has categorically denied, calling the Western media reports "a psychological warfare campaign."

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Al-Monitor's Sam Wendel addresses whether NFL changes to investment rules will attract MENA financiers given their track record with sport investments.

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As Brett McGurk, President Joe Biden's senior Middle East adviser, met with high-ranking Qatari officials in Doha on Tuesday, White House spokesperson John Kirby told Israel's Channel 12 that Iran was "postured and poised" to attack Israel. In Turkey, a court blocks 69 accounts on Twitter while Azerbaijan’s foreign minister, Jeyhun Bayramov, arrives in Ankara.

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Qatari prime minister and top diplomat Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani is in Tehran meeting with his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi, as Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir sparks fresh outrage by saying he would build a synagogue at Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque compound if he could.

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