Israel has strengthened its air defences, expecting retaliation from Iran and its allies for the assassinations of the two militant leaders to take the form of air strikes.
Tehran and its regional proxies, particularly the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah, have amassed a vast arsenal of rockets, missiles and drones over decades and have stretched Israel’s vaunted defenses to the limits in more than 10 months of war since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack from Gaza.
But Israeli officials expect their defense in depth to be tested most seriously in the coming days after last week’s killings of Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut and Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. Israel says it killed Shukr but has neither admitted nor denied responsibility for Haniyeh’s killing.
Much will depend on what attacks Iran, Hezbollah and other regional militias plan.
“If it was a large scale combined attack, simultaneous, coordinated attacks… they could overwhelm the system to some extent,” said Israeli military analyst Jacob Lapin. [projectiles] What damage will occur if it passes through? [they] The damage is unknown.”
Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said this week that the country’s defenses had been bolstered with additional personnel “in the air, at sea and on land” and were on highest alert, but he also warned that the protective bubble provided by the state-of-the-art Iron Dome system and several other platforms “is not complete.”
The system’s vulnerabilities were highlighted last month when a rocket suspected to be from Hezbollah struck a soccer field in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, killing 12 children and sparking the latest escalation of tensions.
But Israelis generally have growing confidence in the Iron Dome, a first layer of defense that has repelled thousands of short-range rockets fired by Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups based in the Gaza Strip since its introduction in 2011. Like other Israeli air defense systems, Iron Dome was funded and developed in partnership with the U.S. military.
The Israel Defense Forces claimed a 90 percent interception rate of bullets fired by Hamas and other militants into populated areas of the country during the 2021 Gaza conflict.
Hamas fired around 3,000 rockets at Israel at the start of the conflict on Oct. 7, but has not released details on interception rates during the current conflict. The system was distorted by the unprecedented barrage, perhaps the largest in a single day in military history, killing at least 10 people, but it did not break down.
Analysts say the high success rate is mainly due to the platform’s advanced radar, which now includes artificial intelligence capabilities, enabling it to determine within seconds which incoming rockets within a range of roughly 70 kilometers are likely to land harmlessly on flat ground and which could injure civilians or soldiers.
It would also allow the IDF to conserve its limited supply of more advanced Tamar interceptor missiles, which cost tens of thousands of dollars per missile.
A maritime version of the Iron Dome (also known as C-Dome) is also deployed on Israeli Navy corvettes and has successfully shot down attack drones fired by Iran-backed Houthi militias at Israeli assets in the Red Sea, as well as drones fired by Hezbollah at gas rigs in the Mediterranean.
Hezbollah has a much larger and more sophisticated arsenal than either Hamas or the Houthis. The militant group is estimated to have around 150,000 long-range, precision-guided rockets and missiles, attack drones, anti-tank missiles and anti-aircraft missiles, many of which experts say were provided by the Iranian government.
According to the CSIS think tank, Iran has “the largest and most diverse missile arsenal” in the Middle East, consisting of thousands of missiles, some of which are capable of striking targets as far as Israel and southeastern Europe.
To counter this threat, Israel has developed a second-tier defense system called the “Stone of David,” whose mission is to shoot down heavier rockets and tactical ballistic missiles such as Scuds at ranges of 100 to 300 kilometers. The system, which began operation in 2017, was first operational over the past year, when its Stunner interceptor missiles shot down multiple projectiles fired from Gaza.
The third tier of air defenses, Arrow 2 and 3, are designed to intercept projectiles that arrive outside the Earth’s atmosphere to protect Israel from long-range ballistic missiles. In most cases, the Arrows intercept projectiles that arrive at high altitudes, far from Israeli airspace. The Arrows first saw combat during the current war, shooting down several incoming ballistic missiles from the Houthis, as well as during a major Iranian attack in April that included over 100 ballistic missiles.
“The logic of the system is that one layer backs up the other,” military analyst Lapin said, and experts agree that overall it works well, but during the current conflict Israel needs help.
The Iranian barrage was Iran’s first direct attack on Israel from its homeland and required the support of a U.S.-led coalition that also included Britain, France and Arab nations, providing a region-wide fleet of early warning radars, missile defense platforms and fighter jets to thwart it. That same coalition is now being deployed again, providing Israel with a new defensive wall that includes protection against cruise missiles and attack drones.
The attack was notified in advance by Iran, giving Israel and its allies time to prepare a defense, and most of the projectiles were destroyed before entering Israeli airspace.
But Israel’s air defenses are by no means impenetrable, and military analysts point to particular challenges as low-tech unmanned aerial vehicles launched by Hezbollah in this conflict have proven difficult to detect, track and shoot down.
The slow-moving, agile drones have wreaked havoc in many parts of northern Israel, despite efforts to stop them using Iron Dome, U.S.-made Patriot artillery batteries, and Israeli fighter jets. Hezbollah has also sent surveillance drones deep into Israel to capture footage of sensitive military sites. Hezbollah-fired projectiles have a much shorter distance to reach Israel than Iranian-fired missiles.
Separately, a Houthi drone strike on central Tel Aviv last month killed one person, highlighting the threat posed by Yemeni rebels.
Tal Inbar of the US-based Alliance for Missile Defense Advocacy said a major problem for which Israel was not adequately prepared was that Hezbollah was actively targeting Israeli air defence and detection systems.
Similarly, a large-scale simultaneous attack by Iran and its allies would be difficult for Israeli systems to detect and track, since the attacks would come from different directions and in different forms, Imber warned.
“The large number of targets and coordinated fire from many locations makes it difficult to paint a ‘sky picture,'” he said, which affects the ability to shoot them down. “The clear assumption is that there will always be more attackers than interceptors,” he added.
Deploying military jargon about what would happen if a barrage of missiles and swarms of drones overwhelmed the country’s defenses, he told Israelis they needed to prepare for a “bigger spillover” than they were accustomed to.
