Middle East peace may be closer as Israel successfully tests Iron Dome

more than 6,000 Kassam rockets in the past eight years). Israel knows exactly where each of the rockets landed. More than 90 percent of these rockets landed in open, uninhabited areas. Strategy Page notes that a thousand interceptor missiles would cost $40 million, but that this would save more than a hundred lives and hundreds of injuries. Israel already has a radar system in place that gives some warning of approaching rockets. Iron Dome will use that system, in addition to another, more specialized radar in southern Israel.

The rocket attacks on Israel had been around since 2001, but became much worse once Israel pulled out of Gaza in August of 2005. From 2001 to 2005, when Israel occupied the Gaza Strip, about 700 rockets had been fired from Gaza into Israel. Since the 2005 withdrawal, more than 3,200 rockets have been fired into Israel. The rate of firings increased after Hamas took control of Gaza in June 2007.

Hamas has been smuggling in more factory-made Iranian and Chinese made BM-21 and BM-12 rockets. Israeli intelligence officials believe Hamas currently has, in Gaza, several hundred factory-made BM-21 rockets, each with a range of 20-40 kilometers. They also have some shorter range (six kilometers) B-12 rockets. The latter are not smuggled in as much as the former because the locally made Kassam II has about the same range. The B-12 is more reliable, though, and more accurate.

The B-12 is a 107 mm, 42 pound, 33-inch long Russian designed rocket popular with insurgents and terrorists. The rocket has a range of about six kilometers and three pounds of explosives in its warhead. It is normally fired from a launcher in salvos of dozens at a time. When used individually, however, it is more accurate the closer it is to the target. This 107 mm design has been copied by many nations, and its popularity with guerrillas and terrorists owes to its small size and portability. There is a Chinese BM-12 variant which has a smaller warhead and larger rocket motor. This version is supposed to have a range of about 12 kilometers.

The 122 mm BM-21s weigh 150 pounds and are nine feet long. These have 45 pound warheads, but not much better accuracy than the 107 mm model. These larger rockets, however, have a maximum range of 20 kilometers. Again, because they are unguided, they are only effective if fired in salvos, or at area targets (cities, large military bases, or industrial complexes). There are Egyptian and Chinese variants that have smaller warheads and larger rocket motors, giving them a range of about 40 kilometers.

Strategy Page writes that the rocket attacks from Gaza have been remarkably ineffective, killing only 37 people (half from rockets, the rest by mortars) in eight years. This means that Hamas has had to fire about 270 rockets or mortar shells for each Israel soldier or civilian they have killed. The price the Palestinian paid was high: Israeli counterfire killed or wounded a Palestinian for every three Palestinian rockets or mortar shells fired. The grim casualty calculation thus shows that 90 Palestinians were killed or wounded for every Israeli killed or wounded.

Up north in Lebanon, Hezbollah, since the summer of 2006, has stockpiled more than 40,000 factory made rockets, mainly BM-21s brought in from Iran via Syria. This is three times as many rockets as the organization had in summer 2006. As we said earlier, during the July-August 2006 war, Hezbollah fired some 4,000 rockets into northern Israel, killing about fifty people, most of them civilians, and destroying or damaging about 100 buildings. Israeli counterattacks killed more than 1,100 Lebanese and some 600 Hezbollah fighters, injured more than 4,000 Lebanese, drove nearly a million Lebanese from their homes, and destroyed more than 10,000 buildings.

Israeli military analysts believe that Hezbollah and Hamas plan to launch a joint rocket attack on Israel eventually, especially as part of an Iranian retaliation against Israel if Israel were to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. The Israelis have been planning more effective countermeasures, which they have not been discussing openly. There is also the option of installing Iron Dome in the north, but that has not been assured yet.