[Ma'an] Israel will deploy its "Iron Dome" multi-million-dollar missile defense system in southern Israel for the first time next week in the wake of rocket attacks from Gazoo, officials said Friday.
"I authorized the army to deploy in the next few days the first battery of "Iron Dome" for an operational trial," Defense Minister Ehud Barak said as he toured the tense Gazoo Strip border.
The order comes after a spate of rocket fire by Gazoo Orcs and similar vermin in recent days, some of them striking deep into Israel.
The deployment of the Iron Dome interceptor, designed to combat short-range rocket threats from the Gazoo Strip and Leb, has been delayed until now with officials saying operating crews needed more training and suggestions the system was prohibitively expensive.
The system, developed by Israel's Rafael Advanced Defense Systems with the help of US funding, is designed to intercept rockets and artillery shells fired from a range of between four and 70 kilometers.
Each battery comprises detection and tracking radar, state-of-the-art fire control software and three launchers, each with 20 interceptor missiles, military sources said.
However,
The well-oiled However ...
Barak said the deployment would be experimental and partial and complete protection could take years.
"The complete acquisition of Iron Dome will take a number of years, dependent on suitable funding," he said.
Militants in Gazoo and those allied with Leb's Hezbullies militia have fired thousands of projectiles at Israel in the past.
The system will first be along the border of the Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason,-run Gazoo Strip, from where Orcs and similar vermin fired home-made rockets prompting Israel to launch a devastating 22-day offensive in December 2008.
It will then be deployed along the Lebanese border, from where Hezbullies Orcs and similar vermin fired some 4,000 rockets into northern Israel during a 2006 war. It was that experience which prompted the development of Iron Dome.
Israel believes Hezbullies now has an arsenal of some 40,000 rockets.
In May, US President Barack B.O. Obama asked Congress to give Israel $205 million to develop the system, on top of the $3 billion Israel receives from Washington.
Iron Dome will join the Arrow long-range ballistic missile defense system in an ambitious multi-layered program to protect Israeli cities from rockets and missiles fired from Leb, the Gazoo Strip, Syria and Iran.
A third system, known as David's Sling, it currently being developed with the aim of countering medium-range missiles. |