Israel and Gaza fire rockets at each other. Jean-Marc Rickli is a security expert at the Center for Security Policy in Geneva (GCSP). In the interview he explains how Israel protects itself against the missiles and what a two-front war would mean for the “Iron Dome” missile shield.
SRF News: How does the “Iron Dome” work exactly?
Jean-Marc Rickli: The “Iron Dome” prevents missiles from hitting populated areas or critical infrastructure. The missile shield does this by using algorithms to calculate the trajectory of projectiles and then deciding whether or not it wants to intercept the missile using a counter-projectile.
Why doesn’t it intercept every bullet?
Because it would be too expensive. Each counter floor of the Iron Dome costs approximately $50,000. That’s why it doesn’t intercept missiles that hit uninhabited areas. Otherwise it would be too expensive and of little use.
Why didn’t the Iron Dome work during the Hamas attack on Saturday?
The “Iron Dome” worked. Without him, the extent of the destruction in Israel would be much worse. The Israeli armed forces said they intercepted 85 to 95 percent of the projectiles.
Why did rockets and projectiles still get through?
Hamas simply fired too many rockets towards Israel on Saturday. Estimates put up to 5,000 rockets within 20 minutes. This can be described as a “swarm strategy”: The “Iron Dome” was simply overwhelmed by the number of projectiles, so some still landed in sensitive places.
Why couldn’t the Israeli forces have foreseen this tactic?
This is still unclear at the moment. There could be various reasons for this. Factors are certainly that in the past many armed forces were moved from the south to the north of Israel and that there was a public holiday in Israel at the weekend. In addition, the Israeli armed forces have arguably relied too heavily on their technological superiority in the past.
Perhaps the Israeli military was a little too complacent.
Like that?
In 2021, the Israeli military made extensive use of artificial intelligence to identify Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad targets. An Israeli intelligence officer said at the time that for the first time artificial intelligence was a key component and a force multiplier in the fight against the enemy. Perhaps the Israeli military was a little too complacent.
Legend:
The “Iron Dome” in action
Rockets fired from the Gaza Strip stopped by the Israeli air defense system over the city of Ashkelon.
Keystone/ATEF SAFADI
Hamas is currently still firing rockets from the Gaza Strip towards Israel. In addition, Hezbollah has now also taken part in the air strikes, so rockets are now also coming from Lebanon. How long will the Iron Dome last?
Israel has ten so-called batteries inside the “Iron Dome”. Each of these batteries covers an area of 150 square kilometers. But this is nowhere near enough to protect the entire country. Only potential targets of high importance such as cities or critical infrastructure can be protected. If attacks also come from Lebanon, Israel would be threatened with a second front and it would then be even more difficult to defend the territory against all air strikes.
The interview was conducted by Loric Lehmann.