Allied fighters and a multi-layered defense: this is how Israel intercepted Iranian drones and missiles

In 1991, when a US-led coalition bombed Iraq after the invasion of Kuwait, Saddam Hussein responded by launching missiles against Israel, Washington's closest ally in the Middle East, both then and today. More people died from incorrectly putting on the gas masks (which the authorities distributed for fear of an attack with chemical weapons) than from the projectiles, but he convinced the country of the need to promote a powerful anti-missile defense system that allowed him this Saturday - with the indispensable help of its allies and the advantage that Iran had renounced the surprise effect and warned its neighbors to mitigate the retaliation - intercepting 99% of the more than 300 drones and missiles that Iran launched, according to data from the Israeli army. The projectiles were also launched from Iraq, Syria and Yemen, where Tehran has allied militias. The Israeli Armed Forces deployed dozens of planes in the air to intercept them. On this Sunday afternoon, they released videos of the moment in which they shot down drones and missiles.

With the attack now over, Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari noted this Sunday that Iran used some 170 drones and all were intercepted before reaching Israeli territory. These are the Shahed 136, a 3.5 meter long device, easy to manufacture and effective in the war in Ukraine, for which Tehran provides them to Russia. However, it is also easy to detect and unable to exceed 180 kilometers per hour. Therefore, it took him several hours to travel the 1,000 kilometers that separate Iran from Israel. This allowed them to be easily monitored and made their launch more of a display of muscle than a tactical asset.

Iran also launched around 30 cruise missiles, of which none arrived, and more than 120 ballistic missiles. “A few” of the latter arrived in Israel, the military spokesman said this Sunday. Cruise missiles, which fly at low altitude and can maneuver along the trajectory, took up to two hours. The ballistic ones, which are shaped like a bell, reach much higher altitudes and are accelerated in the final phase by the force of gravity, although they are more imprecise. They needed just 12 minutes to reach Israel.

The Institute of War Studies, an American center for conflict analysis, assures that the combination of both ballistic and cruise missiles, as well as their launch from different countries, was designed to "confuse and overwhelm Israel's anti-aircraft defenses." It is, he adds, a strategy similar to that used by its ally Russia in Ukraine to overcome Western-made defense systems.

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The Israeli missile defense system is multi-layered. The Arrow system intercepts ballistic missiles, both in space and high in the atmosphere. Another system, David's Honda, allows you to block both drones and rockets or short-range ballistic and cruise missiles (between 100 and 200 kilometers). The best known until the Hamas attack on October 7 was the Iron Dome, designed for drones and smaller projectiles launched from nearby territories, such as those used by the Gaza militias or Hezbollah from Lebanon.

Asked about this, the military spokesman did not clarify what the stelae that could be seen in Jerusalem and that activated the anti-aircraft sirens corresponded to. The explosions that were heard are typical of interceptions by the anti-missile shield, which is only activated when the projectile goes towards populated areas and ignores those that go to uninhabited spaces.

The contrails apparently resulted from both interceptions and shrapnel caused by downed ballistic missiles. In this case, it was already over Israel, either in the sky or in space, as the Arrow system does and can be seen in a video. In fact, the only serious injury (a Bedouin girl near Arad, in the south of the country) was because she was hit by shrapnel.

The main target of the attack appears to have been the Nevatim air base, which houses the F-35s, the most advanced American-made fighter jets. Iran defended having caused "great damage", but the military spokesman stressed that it was "light" and that the facilities remain operational. The army has released a video of several fighters returning to the military base.

The joint nature of the response – with the participation of other countries that do not want to make it public – shows the operational importance for Israel of its allies, particularly Washington. The United States, the United Kingdom and neighboring Jordan (with which it signed a peace agreement in 1994) helped shoot down dozens of the projectiles before entering Israeli territory, also in Syria and Iraq, where Washington has military bases. France also supported the defense of the attack, launched in retaliation for the murder of 13 people, including senior members of the Revolutionary Guard, two weeks ago at an Iranian consular building in Damascus.

Precisely, the Chief of the General Staff of Israel, Herzi Halevi, spoke by telephone this Sunday with General Michael Erik Kurilla, head of the Central Command of the United States Army. He is the country's highest-ranking military officer for the Middle East and traveled urgently to Israel two days before the attack. Halevi expressed “great appreciation for the joint defensive work in thwarting and intercepting the attack,” the army said in a statement.

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