The 12-day Iran-Israel War was a rude awakening not only for Tehran but for Tel Aviv as well, as many Iranian missiles were able to penetrate Israel’s much vaunted multilayered air defense systems and hit densely populated cities as well as high-value military targets.
When Israel launched ‘Operation Rising Lion’ against Iran in June 2025, Iran retaliated with multiple volleys of missiles and drones over the next few days.
During the 12-day conflict, Iran launched nearly 600 missiles and over 1,000 drones at Israel. Of them, almost 50-60 missiles were able to penetrate Israeli air defense systems, killing 29 people.
Iranian missiles were also able to hit five military bases, among them the Mossad headquarters, the Kiryah Military Headquarters, and multiple Israeli air bases.
This massive attack by Iran put Israel’s highly praised multilayered air defense network, composed of Arrow, David’s Sling, Iron Dome, and THAAD, to the test.
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Earlier, during the October 7, 2023, attack, Hamas was able to overwhelm the Israeli air defense systems by launching thousands of rudimentary drones and rockets in a span of 40 minutes.
Together, these two incidents showed that Israel’s multilayered air defense systems were not as invincible as Tel Aviv made them out to be.
Another shortcoming highlighted by the 12-day war with Iran was that even a short war with a middle-ranking power like Iran could strain the missile stockpiles of Israel’s air defense systems, even when complemented by US missile stockpiles.
Iran has a large stockpile of thousands of ballistic missiles, supplemented by hypersonic missiles and drones.
According to multiple military analysts, one critical reason Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to a ceasefire with Iran was Tel Aviv’s fast-depleting stocks of missile interceptors.
In July, US defense officials said that the THAAD operators fired as many as 150 missiles during the 12-day war to shoot down waves of Iranian ballistic missiles.
Worryingly, this accounted for a quarter of all THAAD interceptors ever purchased by the Pentagon, exposing gaps in the US missile defense stockpile.
The lesson for Tel Aviv was crystal clear: it cannot rely exclusively on its existing air defense systems, certainly not in a protracted, intense war.
Another headache for Israel is Iran’s Shahed drones. Their terrain-hugging flight paths and carbon-fibre bodies are hard to detect.
It’s challenging to shoot them down from the ground. By the time a helicopter or fighter jet detects them, closes in, and fires, several critical — sometimes fatal — minutes have already passed.
Ukraine is still struggling to find a reliable, long-term solution for the Russian Geran-2 drones, which are a replica of Iranian Shahed drones.
The lesson was simple: Israel needed a new missile defense doctrine and a new air defense system to supplement its existing multilayered AD systems, and it needed them fast, before the next round of hostilities with Iran begins.
And here comes in the picture, Israel’s Laser defense system, the Iron Beam.
The Iron Beam was in development for several years, and the system became operational in September this year.
Now, Israel’s Defense Ministry research and analysis chief, Dani Gold, has announced that the Iron Beam will be rolled out in the field on December 30.
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Israel’s Iron Beam has already seen action.
In June, Israel’s defense ministry revealed that in October 2024, the Iron Beam had brought down at least 40 drones fired by Hezbollah.
“The Air Defense Array deployed laser systems in the field and achieved especially high interception results that saved civilians’ lives and protected national assets,” the statement said.
“Israel is the first country in the world to present a massive operational laser capability for intercepting threats,” said Brig. Gen. (res.) Danny Gold, head of the Defense Ministry’s Directorate of Defense Research and Development, or MAFAT.
Explaining the urgency behind the integration of Iron Beam, Dr. Y., the system engineer of Iron Beam, said, “I think it needs to be put in context. October 7, everyone wakes up and thinks what they can do. So after we went to donate blood, we met and started thinking, OK, what can we do now? Since we are all identified with laser, we said, OK, what can we do with laser?”
Lt. Col. Y., head of the high-power laser branch at MAFAT, said, “Iron Beam is a ground-based high-power laser weapon system, 100 kilowatts, the first of its kind in the world to enter regular operational service. The system proved effective in intercepting rockets, mortar bombs, and UAVs at ranges of up to 10 kilometers.”
Iron Beam will be integrated with Iron Dome’s warning and command-and-control systems. Whenever incoming aerial threats are identified, the system will decide within seconds whether to fire a US$50,000 Iron Dome missile or a laser shot costing about half a dollar.
Defense Ministry Director-General Amir Baram has previously said that Iron Beam will lay the foundation stone for the process, which will change battle zones worldwide until they are inevitably filled with cheaper laser platforms.
In fact, using Iron Beam is as cheap as turning on lights.
Therefore, Iron Beam, or laser weapons, are a perfect solution for the threat posed by low-flying, cheap drones.
The cost per shot of Iron Beam is hundreds of times lower than that of a Shahed-type drone.
Another advantage is unlimited magazine depth. If a 12-day war with Iran depleted US and Israeli stockpiles of interceptor missiles, there would not be any such constraints in using Iron Beam.
Additionally, it can simultaneously tackle dozens of aerial threats. During the October 7 attack, Hamas overwhelmed the Israeli AD systems by firing thousands of rockets and drones simultaneously; however, Iron Beam will be better prepared to tackle such threats.
Besides, the interception will be much faster, as Iron Beam can shoot down enemy aerial threats almost at the speed of light.
Israel is not the only country working on laser weapons. India, China, Russia, the UK, the US, Germany, and Japan are all at various stages of developing and testing laser defense systems; however, Israel would be the first country to deploy them in the field.
In 2024, the US Navy successfully tested its High-Energy Laser with Integrated Optical Dazzler and Surveillance (HELIOS) system on the USS Preble, using it to shoot down an unmanned aerial target.
In April this year, India also successfully tested a potent 30-kilowatt laser-based system to disable, degrade, or destroy small remotely-piloted aircraft, swarm drones, missiles, and sensors.
Israel is also developing Lite Beam (10 kilowatt beam), to be mounted on ground forces vehicles, and Iron Beam M (50 kilowatt beam), to be mounted on trucks.
Together, these systems will augment Israel’s existing multilayered air defense systems. However, it must be noted that so far, these laser weapons, or directed energy weapons, have not been tested in real battlefield conditions, such as during the Iran-Israel War, or the October 7 Hamas attack, and thus, it remains to be seen how they will perform during intense war situations.
- Sumit Ahlawat has over a decade of experience in news media. He has worked with Press Trust of India, Times Now, Zee News, Economic Times, and Microsoft News. He holds a Master’s Degree in International Media and Modern History from the University of Sheffield, UK.
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- He can be reached at ahlawat.sumit85 (at) gmail.com
