Israel’s much-vaunted Iron Dome missile defence system is intercepting a barrage of rockets fired by Hamas and other Palestinian militants from Gaza as bloody clashes escalate.
According to the Jewish state’s army, 200 of the more than 480 rockets which have been fired since Monday have been shot out of the sky by the system.
They claim that around 150 rockets fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israeli territory exploded inside the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli-designed Iron Dome system is meant to protect populated areas and critical assets by neutralising short-range aerial threats.
The first battery was deployed in March 2011 near the southern city of Beersheva — 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the Gaza Strip, and a favourite Hamas target — to combat Soviet-designed Grad rockets fired from the Palestinian territory. Israel now has 10 such batteries.
2,400 projectiles intercepted
The head of the Israel Missile Defense Organization, Moshe Patel, said that up to January Iron Dome had…