An intricate network of Israel ‘s missile defense tech faced a serious test of its mettle Saturday night, downing ’99 percent’ of an aerial assault launched from Iran . Approximately 170 Iranian drones, 120 ballistic missiles and over 30 cruise missiles had been launched from Iranian territory in the attack , soaring over 1,100 miles. Iran’s airborne phalanx was repelled by ground-based anti-air missiles with names like the ‘Iron Dome,’ ‘David’s Sling’ and ‘Arrow-3,’ the latest hardware in Israel’s frequently updated national defense arsenal. Below, an overview of the equipment Israel has developed, sometimes with the help of American military contractors, and how it keeps bombardments in check.
Iron Dome: First operational in 2011, Israel’s Iron Dome faced its first test over a decade ago, when militants in Gaza fired an estimated 1,500 rockets at Israel over eight days in November of 2014. In the dome’s decade of operation, officials with the Israeli Defense Force have reported a success rate of 90 percent: a statistic that’s difficult to assess given that the system is designed to go after only those rockets on course for real damage. Each of the 10 Iron Dome missile batteries known to exist is equipped with radar to detect airborne targets and a connection to an automated command-and-control system for remote firing calculations.
When one of the Dome’s missile batteries detects a rocket on radar, it relays that projectile’s speed and trajectory data to its control center, which then uses that information to determine if the rocket is likely to hit a populated area. A missile is fired from the battery’s matrix of 20 interceptor missiles only if the detected rocket missile poses a genuine threat, a cost-saving measure given the low-tech barrage of rockets fired by Hamas, Hezbollah and other regional militants, whose equipment tends to be less than precise. The Iron Dome system is also designed to intercept rockets and missiles flying in high arcs, which can otherwise make the objects harder to counterstrike. But the hardware has not been without its share of criticism domestically. Early in its operation, a military analyst and ex-fighter pilot at Israel’s Tel Aviv University, Reuven Pedatzur , for example, argued that the Iron Dome was too expensive.
Militants, Pedatzur argued, could effectively drain Israel’s budget as pricey Dome missiles, which can run up to $100,000 apiece, were wasted on militants’ dramatically cheaper rockets, which at that time cost about $5. Israel’s laser-blasting solution to the cost issue, dubbed the Iron Beam, is currently in development. Iron Beam’s 100-kilowatt laser is designed to intercept and detonate threats as structurally different as rockets, artillery, mortars and drones from miles away. ‘I’d seen the system when I last went to Israel, I saw the first prototype,’ the US Army’s assistant secretary for acquisition, logistics and technology, Doug Bush, said last November. ‘It’s intriguing.’ ‘There’s potential if theirs works well, it could be something we could think about leveraging for our needs in that space,’ Bush told DefenseScoop , adding that the Iron Beam served as a compliment to the Pentagon’s own Indirect Fire Protection Capability-High Energy Laser (IFPC-HEL) prototype.
Arrow-3: The latest and arguably the top of Israel’s current system, the Arrow-3, was created specifically to take down ballistic missiles armed with nuclear and other ‘nonconventional’ warheads — including those coming in from outer space. Israel’s chief military spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said after last Saturday’s assault that the Arrow-3 had ‘proved itself against a significant number of ballistic missiles’ fired by Iran this weekend, albeit of a much more conventional kind. Arrow-3’s missile interceptors are significantly larger than those fired by the Iron Dome, which are typically only just 6-inches wide and 10-feet long, but still guided by sophisticated miniature sensors for the more persistent threat of short-range rocket attacks.
Arrow-3 missiles by contrast are substantial two-stage rockets, 23-feet long in size, that can go at hypersonic speeds. Prior to Saturday’s attack, Arrow-3 had gotten use striking long-range missiles launched from Yemen by Houthi militants, who are engaged in a civil war on the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula and have chosen sides in Israel’s Gaza conflict. US military contractor Boeing and the Israeli government-owned firm Israel Aerospace Industries worked in cooperation to develop the Arrow-3 with substantial investment from the United States. The success of the space-ready interceptor missile has now led to a $3.5 billion agreement, approved by the US, allowing Israel to sell Arrow-3 systems to Germany.
David’s Sling: Like the Arrow-3, the David’s Sling, previously called the ‘Magic Wand’ is a two-stage rocket with a powerful range for intercepting larger missiles. According to the Missile Threat project at the Center for International and Strategic Studies (CSIS), the system uses both Stunner and SkyCeptor kinetic so-called ‘hit to kill’ interceptors. These anti-air missiles have a range of over 160 miles and can travel at blinding speeds up to 7.5 Mach. The SkyCeptor, in particular, was designed to be a more cost effective but no less effective replacement for US-made Patriot missiles.
Each of these interceptors has two targeting and guidance systems installed in the tip of the missile’s nose, along with an electro-optical sensor for further identification of its target. David’s Sling was a collaboration between Israeli defense firm Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and US defense titan Raytheon, which has made everything from fighter jet radar to NSA listening posts for America’s national security apparatus. The Sling, of course, takes its name from the famous weapon used by King David in the Biblical story of David and Goliath, but the name was also meant to reference its long-distance range.
‘We’ll be able to intercept threats at high altitude in enemy territories, not exactly over Israel,’ one Rafael official told the Associated Press . ‘We don’t want it falling on us, but over the enemy.’ Originally, the joint-project had been developed to specifically combat medium-range missiles reportedly in the possession of the militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon, north of Israel. But other US allies are now pursuing Raytheon partnerships for their own version of SkyCeptor — including Romania which initiated a three-year investment project in 2023 to build the missile interceptors, in part, due to the protracted conflict in nearby Ukraine.
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