How Israel’s Iron Dome works as officials say it blocked 99% of Iran strikes

Iran launched more than 300 drones and missiles at Israel on Saturday, according to an Israeli official, and 99 per cent were intercepted.

After decades of enmity and proxy conflict, Iran directly attacked Israel for the first time on Saturday.

A top Israeli military official said Iran fired 170 drones, more than 120 ballistic missiles, and over 30 cruise missiles at Israel, and that 99 per cent were intercepted.

A seven-year-old girl was reported severely injured by shrapnel from a missile that severely injured her, not the missile itself. The strikes followed a suspected Israeli airstrike on the Iranian embassy in Syria earlier this month that killed multiple Iranian military leaders.

The militaries of the United States and the United Kingdom helped shoot down Iran’s swarm of projectiles and drones, but so did Israel’s own missile defence systems known as the “Iron Dome.”

So how does it work?

Israel’s Iron Dome is a short-range missile defence system that targets drones, mortars and rockets between four and 70 kilometres away with a 90 per cent success rate, according to the Israeli government.

An Israeli state-owned firm designed it to protect the country’s population from the kinds of attacks the terrorist groups Hamas typically and sporadically launched at the country before Oct. 7, 2023, and it has done so thousands of times since it was first deployed in 2011.

The system quickly determines if an incoming rocket is on course to hit a populated area.