The Iron Dome: How was Israel's world-renowned missile defence system overwhelmed?
The core of the Hamas strategy to defeat the Iron Dome lay in the fact that the rockets used are far cheaper to make than Israel's Tamir Interceptor missiles, making its success a race to see who will run out of ammunition first
Hamas launched a massive surprise attack on 7 October 2023 from Gaza, with land invasions, amphibious assaults and air drops with motorised gliders. During this attack and the ensuing Israeli counterattack more than 500 Israelis and Palestinians have been killed.
This attack on Israel was led by massive salvos of over 5,000 rockets and artillery in a 20 minute period. This led to the Iron Dome system being overwhelmed after emptying themselves in the initial salvoes and leaving their defences open as they began to reload, reports NDTV.
As a result more and more Hamas ordinance began to hit their targets.
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The core of the Hamas strategy to defeat the Iron Dome lay in the fact that the rockets used are far cheaper to make than Israel's Tamir Interceptor missiles, making its success a race to see who will run out of ammunition first.
This initial wave of rocket and artillery strikes, coinciding with invasion forces appearing in multiple fronts is what has led Hamas to its current success, however how long it will last as Israel and its allies regroup is yet to be seen.
On the ground, along the tense border fence between Gaza and Israel, an array of surveillance tools, including cameras, ground-motion sensors, and regular army patrols, is in place.
The barbed-wire-topped fence was designed as a "smart barrier" precisely to prevent the kind of infiltration witnessed in this recent attack, the BBC reported.
However, Hamas fighters managed to breach it by bulldozing their way through, cutting holes in the wire, or even entering Israel via the sea and paragliding.
Israel's Iron Dome system was developed in a collaboration between Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israel Aerospace Industries, and was deployed and declared operational in March 2011.
The Iron Dome is a short range missile and artillery defence system, with an operating window between four and 70 kilometres. It was specifically designed to protect populated Israeli areas from missile attacks from nearby countries.
This system consists of three main components, a radar system, a control system and a launcher system. Radars are used to detect incoming ordinance and missiles, the control system then calculates the trajectory of incoming weapons and decides whether it should be intercepted or not.
The launcher system is a mobile missile launcher that can launch up to 20 Tamir Interceptor missiles developed by Rafael Advanced Defense. These missiles used advanced electro-optic sensors and multiple steering fins grant it impressive manoeuvrability and tracking. Once it is in range the missiles use a proximity fuse to detonate or redirect incoming munitions.
This system has been lauded around the world for its effectiveness, during the 2014 Gaza War, it is credited with intercepting over 90% of rockets fired at Israel from Gaza, says the Times of Israel.
The United States has purchased several of these systems for their own use.
