Every so often part of Israel, usually in the South, gets bombarded with some rockets fired by one Arab terrorist organization or another. In recent times, the Israeli Air Defense Command has been intercepting these rockets with the IRON DOME AA system. It is an amazing bit of technology. The control radar is able to track an incoming missile, and predict where it will fall. If it is not a threat to an area where people live, the system ignores it. If it does pose a threat to a populated location a missile is launched to take out the attacker. It has a success rate of about 95%.
Of course, defensive systems by themselves are not enough to deter attacks. There is usually an Israeli military response, too. Most of the time it takes the form of an Israeli Air Force attack, using “smart munitions” on some location that is used by a terrorist group. Targets have included launching sites, training bases, weapons storage, and manufacturing sites. In almost every case, the Israeli Government precedes the attack with a series of warnings to local civilian non-combatants. The warning, according to various press reports, consist of dropping leaflets telling people to leave the area, loudspeaker warnings to areas near the border, TV broadcasts in Arabic, and even direct telephone calls to families living in the target structure, or close by. All of that is done because Israel tries not to harm non-combatants, and the terrorist organizations like to hide their operations by using that same civilian population as a human shield to prevent an Israeli attack.
Recently, there has been a new activity not far from our borders. Iran has regularly tried to move weapons, especially including more sophisticated missiles, across Syria and into Lebanon. There those weapons are set to be given to an Iranian client terror organization called Hizbullah. The operations have been coordinated by an Iranian General named Kassem Suleimani. Last week he coordinated a violent demonstration at the US Embassy in Baghdad. The US response was fairly rapid. Additional American Marines were airlifted in to protect the embassy.Then AMERICAN air power was used to target, and kill, the Iranian general. The United States has been involved in cutting back the numbers of American troops deployed in our region. Apparently the Iranians mistakenly interpreted that as a sign of weakness.
So far, all I’ve seen is some of the usual combative rhetoric from Iran. I hope that will be all that happens. It appears to me that the ball is in their court. I’d like to see them agree to stop trying to build nuclear weapons and settle down to being a less aggressive bully. During the past year they have supported the Assad dictatorship in Syria, fomented civil war in Yemen, attacked Saudi oil fields with drones, sent arms to Hizbullah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. Seems to me they should consider trying a different approach. If not, a lot of people are likely to suffer.
Wetherhorn 