The Iron Dome is a highly advanced air defence system which Israel uses to tackle rocket attacks
Israel continued to pound Gaza on Thursday, vowing to "destroy" Hamas on the sixth day after a surprise terror attack. Hamas fired thousands of rockets from Gaza into Israel on Saturday, overwhelming the nearly impenetrable system the Iron Dome.
The Iron Dome is a highly advanced air defence system which Israel uses to tackle rocket attacks, mortar shells and also Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs).
The system employs a network of radars to detect threats and get real-time information about the launch and trajectory of the incoming projectiles.
Once a threat is detected, it tracks and then predicts a course for the incoming threat. If the projectile is heading to a populated area, the Iron Dome fires an interceptor missile, called Tamir.
The Tamir missile is designed to destroy the incoming threat, and can adjust its course in real time to ensure an accurate intercept.
Israel pays as much as $100,000 for each inceptor and $50,000 for every Tamir missile. On Saturday, Hamas overwhelmed the system by firing 5,000 missiles within a span of 20 minutes. This means, even if the Iron Dome had managed to stop all the missiles, it would have cost Israel over $250,000 (Rs 2,079 crore).
An Israeli journalist, Hananya Naftali, shared a video of the Iron Dome in action as Hamas launched a barrage of missiles at Israel in the night.
"The Iron Dome had a busy day today," he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
Israel has vowed to annihilate the Hamas movement that rules the Gaza Strip in retribution for the deadliest attack on Jews since the Holocaust, when hundreds of gunmen poured across the barrier fence and rampaged through Israeli towns on Saturday.
The gunmen killed at least 1,200 people, mostly civilians gunned down in their homes or on the streets, and carried scores of hostages back to Gaza.
Israel has responded so far by putting the enclave, home to 2.3 million people, under total siege and launching by far the most powerful bombing campaign in the 75-year history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, destroying whole neighbourhoods.
Gaza authorities say more than 1,200 people have been killed and more 5,000 people have been wounded in the bombing.