PEACE with Penny

Israel’s Super Hero – Iron Dome

Iron Dome

Did you know that Israel has a very real Super Hero?  I didn’t.  Not until I went to Israel on vacation with my family and friends, in July 2014.  Nothing can prepare you for the juxtaposition of touring wondrous, sacred places by day, and spending nights and a few mornings in bomb shelters.  The time in bomb shelters in the scheme of things, was always just a few minutes. But their affect will last a lifetime.  For me, the missiles coming at us, blasted me out of my complacency.  Sure, as a Jew, I always cared about Israel – but they were very far away, and I was enjoying my family life in suburbia.

Nothing like having deadly projectiles soaring toward you AND your precious son, to get you off your duff to want to do something about it. First, I had to get past my mama bear attitude of wanting the Palestinians to pay for trying to KILL MY SON and the rest of us.  Cowering in our first bomb shelter, I thought, F-them!  Make them pay Israeli Defense Forces! Thankfully, my initial response was only momentary.  I was almost as shocked by my reaction to being bombed, as I was finding myself in these circumstances. I couldn’t believe my own thoughts. Is this the same person who at home felt guilty about accidentally stepping on a bug?  These feelings gave me a hint of understanding for the primitive need for revenge brought about as a result of fear and the demand for a warped sense of justice.  In that moment, it seemed like meeting might with might was the ONLY legitimate answer.  This was only my first reaction, to my first bombing.  Israelis have lived with this daily fear for years.  Now with the stabbings and car rammings – well, I now have a visceral compassion for what living with the constant threat of death can do to a person’s psyche.

The thought of another generation – my son’s generation, also living with the threat of violence, is untenable, so now I do what I can to move toward Peace. That’s the reason for writing my book, my blog, working with Peace activists – the violence has to stop!  It does no one any good.  Another life taken in revenge can never bring back your loved one or solve your feelings of despair!

Iron Dome isn’t human, but it’s saved countless lives.  What is it?  What we were hearing and feeling in the bomb shelter, we were told, was Iron Dome – blowing up the missiles.  You actually can feel the angry blasts of invisible, air pulsate throughout the room with a violent, percussive tremor.  We would later find out, the explosions we felt were actually twenty miles away!  I had no desire for them to get any closer, but on our journey, that would not be the case.

What is Iron Dome?  It is a mobile air defense system that tracks incoming short-range rockets and artillery shells.  It intercepts them and blows them up.  Iron Dome is 90% accurate1.  My mind still ponders what happens with the 10%.

There is a huge disparity between how many missiles were launched against Israel, and how many Israel was able to destroy before harm would come to their citizens.  During Operation Protective Edge, the name of the 50-day conflict that began while we were in Israel, 3,360 missiles were sent from Gaza2.  475 of those intended to kill Israelis sent from Gaza, exploded within their own territory.3   Only 584 were intercepted by Iron Dome.4  Why?  There are several factors to consider.  The cost of Iron Dome is $50 million dollars per battery5.  What is a battery?  It is an intercepting missile launcher that usually has about 20 missiles, ready to launch.6   In 2014, there were ten located throughout Israel.7 Additionally, it costs US$20,000 dollars per rocket8 sent to blow up the incoming missiles.  Due to the extreme cost, Israel tracks the missiles and determines whether or not it’s trajectory is headed toward a populated location.  If not, they let it land.  Worrying about whether or not we were considered to be in a populated area, was definitely a concern – even more than we knew at the time : (

Additionally, as we waited in fear in the bomb shelter, we were told to “wait ten minutes inside our refuge while the fragments from the blown up missiles fall from the sky to the ground.”   But many Israelis don’t bother to wait the full five minutes!  Amazing, let’s get this bombing inconvenience over with, and move on with our day.  To Israelis, this was just another day at the office.  We tourists, however, waited obediently until every last second of the ten minutes had passed.

Scarily, looking back at the statistics, 2,303 did hit Israel.9    The Israeli mantra, “Iron Dome will protect you,” doesn’t seem to be quite as bullet proof as we were told, yet it still may be – the answer lies somewhere in those that were allowed to land.  Throughout our trip, we held to the surety that Iron Dome would be able to protect us.  We were in Israel at the beginning of the confrontation, was Iron Dome used more frequently then?  I will never know.  Deciding when to use Iron Dome I’m sure is a complicated formula that has many complex factors even beyond the trajectory or cost and I’m grateful that experts make these decisions.  When used, it is an amazing Super Hero.  But I still wonder if our potentially misplaced confidence was built on a house of cards and could have come crashing down at any moment.

Nonetheless, its effectiveness in protecting Israelis when it is used, has been amazing. If Israel has to use weapons, at least this weapon is defensive. Iron Dome’s success in preventing Israeli deaths has inadvertently helped create the illusion of Israel being a bully in its own defense.  There were comparatively so few Israelis killed vs. Palestinians.  Given the thousands of missiles launched against Israel, how many Israelis would be dead if not for this miracle weapon?  Less dead and injured people is a good thing – don’t you agree?

So it goes.  Missiles flying, people dying in a very sick dance of hatred and revenge.  It’s amazing to me that all it would take is for both sides to just stop.  I say this with the greatest empathy.  I am very grateful that I haven’t had to live with the fear, pain, killed and injured loved ones, or disillusion that all sides live with every day of their lives.  This is a vile snow ball rolling down the hill of despair picking up more and more bodies and shattered lives along the way.  When will that hot, blistering desert sun, melt the snow ball and stop it in its tracks?  I can only hope that someday, sooner than later, sanity will prevail and the same energy will be put toward Peace.  Amen.

Footnotes:

  1. Katz, Yaakov (March 10, 2012), “Iron Dome ups its interception rate to over 90%.”  The Jerusalem Post.  Retrieved March 10, 2012.
  2. Israel Defense Forces “Operation Protective Edge by the Numbers.”   https://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/08/05/operation-protective-edge-numbers/ Published on August 5, 2014.
  3. Israel Defense Forces “Operation Protective Edge by the Numbers.”   https://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/08/05/operation-protective-edge-numbers/  Published on August 5, 2014.
  4. Israel Defense Forces “Operation Protective Edge by the Numbers.”   https://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/08/05/operation-protective-edge-numbers/ Published on August 5, 2014.
  5. “The secret of the wonder weapon that Israel will show off to Obama”, Time, March 13, 2013.
  6. “The secret of the wonder weapon that Israel will show off to Obama”, Time, March 13, 2013.
  7. “Tenth Iron Dome battery deployed to protect Israel from rockets,” The Jerusalem Post, By Yaakov Lappin, 7/15/2014
  8. “Israel’s Iron Dome changes the face of battle,” Ynet News, (Associated Press), 7/12/2014.
  9. Israel Defense Forces “Operation Protective Edge by the Numbers.”   https://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/08/05/operation-protective-edge-numbers/ Published on August 5, 2014.

1 comment

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