Israel may control the skies over Iran, but Tehran’s missiles are still a threat : NPR

Israel says it has crippled Iran’s air defenses and that it can now strike targets across the country at will. Although Israel’s own defenses remain largely intact despite nightly barrages launched by Tehran, some missiles are getting through with deadly results.

Since Friday, Israel has used U.S.-supplied state-of-the-art F-35 fighters and other aircraft to carry out hundreds of airstrikes against Iran’s air defenses and sites it says are being used to develop nuclear weapons. Not a single Israeli aircraft has been shot down in the operation so far, Israel authorities says.

Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, appearing Sunday on Fox News, also offered details of what he described as a successful Israeli intelligence operation to infiltrate western Iran and disable its remaining air defenses in the area. As a result of the Mossad operation, Israel has a “free highway to Tehran,” Netanyahu said.

Chuck Freilich, a former deputy national security advisor in Israel who is now at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, says Israel has “succeeded quite nicely in clearing Iranian airspace so that it can conduct operations against other sites.”

Freilich acknowledges that while all of Iran’s air defenses have yet to be destroyed “the vast majority… those that might pose a significant threat to Israeli aircraft have [been].”

In October, during tit-for-tat missile and drone attacks between Israel and Iran, Tehran’s air defenses reportedly sustained serious damage. Israel likely believed that Iran couldn’t withstand a major air assault at the moment, a fact that likely played a role in the timing of the current operation.

Israel’s main targets include Iran’s two most important nuclear sites that are used for processing, or “enriching” radioactive uranium into the purity needed to produce atomic weapons. The first is the Natanz uranium enrichment site, which is largely underground and the second is the Fordow enrichment site built deep inside a mountain. They are particularly challenging to destroy and it isn’t clear if that can be done without additional help from the U.S., which could provide Israel with special bunker-busting bombs to penetrate the underground facilities.

President Trump has expressed strong support for Israel, but has made clear that the U.S. Israel’s current operation does not include the use of missile defenses, which have been used to target top Iranian commanders and reportedly resulted in the deaths of dozens of civilians.

Israel’s missile defense systems are diverse and designed to counter different types of threats. The most well-known system is Iron Dome, which intercepts short-range rockets, including those frequently launched by groups like Hamas. Since October 2023, Iron Dome has successfully intercepted the majority of missiles launched by Iran and its allies, such as Hezbollah and the Houthis.

However, recent Iranian missile attacks have overwhelmed Israel’s defenses, resulting in some missiles reaching their targets and causing significant damage. In response, Iron Dome is now being used to intercept falling missile fragments to prevent further harm.

Israel has also targeted a significant portion of Iran’s mobile missile launchers, which are difficult to locate due to Iran’s mountainous terrain. By destroying these launchers, Israel aims to limit Iran’s ability to retaliate effectively.

The focus of the campaign is on eliminating the launchers rather than the missiles themselves, in order to prevent further attacks.