TPC Staff
The Palestine Chronicle / October 5, 2024
Israel’s air defense systems, like the Arrow 2 and 3, were unable to intercept all missiles, highlighting the difficulty of defending against fast, numerous ballistic missiles.
A report published in the Wall Street Journal on Friday confirmed that Iran’s recent barrage of ballistic missiles targeting Israel overwhelmed some of Israel’s air defenses, causing damage.
“The assessment means that any new Iranian strikes against Israel, if launched, could have much more serious consequences if they target civilian infrastructure or heavily populated residential areas,” according to the report.
The paper also stressed that, “unlike April 13, when Iran fired a large number of slower cruise missiles and drones, Tuesday’s barrage was made up exclusively of some 180 much faster ballistic missiles, one of the largest such strikes in the history of warfare.”
Independent researchers, analysing satellite imagery, noted that about 32 missiles hit the Nevatim military air base.
“Satellite images of a target on Tuesday—the Nevatim air base in southern Israel, home to its F-35 jet fighters—show that as many as 32 Iranian missiles managed to land within the base’s perimeter, according to analysis by professor Jeffrey Lewis, at the Middlebury Institute for International Studies in Monterey, Calif,” the report said.
Lewis highlighted that “Thirty-two missiles is a lot of missiles” and that “we have exaggerated ideas about the effectiveness of air defenses. We have this pop-culture idea that missile defenses are much more effective or available than they actually are.”
Indeed, according to the report, Israel’s air defense systems, like the Arrow 2 and 3, were unable to intercept all missiles, highlighting the difficulty of defending against fast, numerous ballistic missiles.
“The faster the missile, the harder it is to intercept it, that’s simple physics,” Ulrich Kühn, head of research for arms control at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy in Hamburg, Germany, was quoted as saying.
The report suggests that future Iranian strikes could have more devastating consequences if they target civilian infrastructure or populated areas.
“That is an important consideration as Israel contemplates its military response. Tehran has threatened strikes on Israeli power plants and oil refineries if Israel hits Iranian territory in a counterattack expected in the coming days,” the WSJ reported.
While Israel is expected to retaliate, Iran’s missile production capabilities are likely to be targeted, as they remain a critical vulnerability.
Iran possesses a large arsenal of over 3,000 ballistic missiles, many stored in underground facilities, while its production plants are less protected and could be targeted in future Israeli strikes.
