https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-895553

Norway to buy Rafael's Trophy protection system

APS systems such as Trophy are designed to detect and intercept any anti-tank threats before hitting the platform

Even though Norway is one of the European countries most critical of Israel, what happens in the diplomatic arena is not necessarily reflected in defense procurement. Germany has begun supplying Norway with Leopard 2A8NOR tanks in the first sale of the advanced platform, which also carries Israeli technology.

Each 2A8-series tank has the Eurotrophy system, the European version of Israeli company Rafael Advanced Defense Systems Trophy, active protection system for military armored vehicles.

Eurotrophy is a joint venture by Rafael, Germany's KMW and General Dynamics Land Systems Europe for the production, marketing and sale of Trophy systems in Europe. Trophy has been operational since 2010. In 2018, Trophy was sold to the US Armored Forces and in 2021, it was selected for the German Leopard and British Challenger tanks.

The system is currently installed on 16 platforms around the world, but it had not been operated on any major scale to protect tanks until the war which began in October 2023, with hundreds of maneuverable systems in the field. In meeting the challenge of anti-tank missiles, which military experts define as unprecedented, the system is successfully withstanding attacks from Hezbollah on Israel's northern front.

Trophy has been operational since 2011 and according to Rafael’s website, the company has sold over 2,000 platforms which have seen over 2 million hours of operations. As threats to armored vehicles evolve, from RPGs to advanced anti-tank guided missiles, the integration of active protection systems like TROPHY is seen as essential for maintaining battlefield dominance.

Installed on the Merkava IV and Namer APC, Trophy was used extensively by the IDF, especially during the recent Israel-Hamas War. The system has also been installed on over a dozen different platforms around the world including the US Army’s Abrams MBTs, the UK’s Challenger MBTsas well as the Boxer, Patria AMV and others.

    Trophy on a Leopard Tank

In January, EuroTrophy GmbH, the German subsidiary of Israel’s defense group Rafael Advanced Defense Technologies, announced that it had signed a €330 million contract with KNDS Deutschland to supply its Trophy active protection system (APS) for the Leopard 2 A8 main battle tank programs of Lithuania, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, and Croatia.

APS systems such as Trophy are designed to detect and intercept any anti-tank threats before hitting the platform, including anti-tank guided missiles, RPGs, drones and more. Developed as a result of cooperation between the IDF and Rafael, the company describes it as “the world’s only combat-proven active protection system.”

https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-895553

Bombing Railways during WW2

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/426756

They won the war but could the Allies have saved the Jewish people?

For us in 2026, faced with a resurgence of antisemitism and innocent Jews once again being targeted-- by fanatical Muslims and deluded leftists-the lesson of V-E Day must remind us that neutrality in the face of antisemitism is a form of complicity. Opinion.

The world rightfully pauses on May 8, 2026, to celebrate the 81st anniversary of Victory in Europe (V-E) Day, when the Allies triumphed over the darkest tyranny the modern age has ever known, when an entire continent was scarred by six years of total war.

Yet, for many, the celebration is haunted by the silence of six million Jews who did not live to cheer the liberation, whose ashes were already scattered by the time the first Allied tanks rolled into the killing centers of Auschwitz and elsewhere.

The sad irony is that the Allied powers-primarily the United States and Great Britain-possessed both military intelligence and logistical means to intervene long before the spring of 1945.

By mid-1944, the Allies had achieved air superiority over Europe. Reconnaissance photos taken by the U.S. Army Air Force clearly showed the gas chambers and crematoria of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Jewish leaders pleaded with the U.S. War Department to bomb the rail lines leading to the camps and to bomb the death chambers and ovens. The requests were repeatedly denied on the grounds that such missions would divert air support from the front lines.

Yet, on several occasions, American B-17 and B-24 heavy bombers, escorted by P-51 Mustangs, attacked the IG Farben industrial complex-less than five miles from the Auschwitz gas chambers.

The potential was there; the political will was not.

In 1940, when Germany invaded France, the German court administrator Friedrich Kellner, under surveillance by the Gestapo for speaking out against Nazi policies, wrote in his diary: “If France and England had destroyed our railway lines and bridges, they could have kept us from transporting our troops from Poland to the French border."

Two years later he returned to the topic: “The Allies could have brought about a breakdown here had they disrupted the railroad lines. There is not enough gasoline or oil for motor vehicles."

Bombing the rails might not have ended the Holocaust, but it would have disrupted the terrifying logistics of mass murder during the peak of the 1944 Hungarian Jewish deportations.

Hungary’s Jewish problem is found in a newspaper clipping in Kellner’s diary, with the headline, Clearing Southeast Europe of Jews: “Hungary, which is especially plagued by Jews, and counts 800,000 Jews, has embarked on a complicated path for gradual expulsion of Jews and has already attained worthwhile results."

Beneath the clipping, Kellner wrote, “This so-called ‘clearing Europe of Jews’ will remain a dark chapter in the history of mankind. If we in Europe are so far gone that we simply eliminate people, then Europe is irretrievably lost. Today it is the Jews; tomorrow it will be another weak tribe that is exterminated."

In the early summer of 1944, Hungarian and German authorities sent 440,000 Hungarian Jews to be murdered at Auschwitz. Over a two-month period they filled 147 freight trains that traveled back and forth upon the undisturbed rails.

One decade before that, a shift in immigration policy could have saved so many lives. Had the Allies signaled a willingness to accept Jewish refugees in the 1930s and early 40s-to suspend the restrictive quotas in the United States and allow entrance into Palestine (despite Arab objections)-thousands could have escaped before the borders were sealed.

In addition, the Allies could have shortened the war by being more flexible with the "Unconditional Surrender" policy established at the Casablanca Conference in 1943.

While the intent was to ensure the total eradication of Nazism, the rigidity of the demand inadvertently incentivized the German military to fight to the bitter end. Providing a more viable path for anti-Hitler resisters-such as those involved in the July 20 plot-might have encouraged more internal coups and even the surrender of individual army units on the Western Front.

Had the war ended even three months sooner it might have saved tens of thousands of lives, including those lost in the death marches of early 1945.

Unfortunately, the Allies viewed the dilemma of the Jews of Europe as a tragic byproduct of war-a humanitarian issue to be settled after the fighting.

But it was a central objective of their enemy and required a specific strategic response.

For us in 2026, faced with a resurgence of antisemitism and innocent Jews once again being targeted by Nazi types-led by fanatical Muslims and deluded leftists-the lesson of V-E Day must include a somber reflection on the cost of delay in stopping such irrational haters, reminding us that neutrality in the face of antisemitism is a form of complicity.

At war’s end, Friedrich Kellner wrote something in his diary that we ourselves must somehow achieve: “The once so proud German army was totally beaten on all fronts, and no one can ever dispute it. The enormous defeat of this war will hopefully help to remove the military spirit from the minds of our people."

Robert Scott Kellner, a navy veteran and member of the American Legion, is a retired English professor who taught at the University of Massachusetts and Texas A & M University. He is the grandson of the German justice inspector and diarist Friedrich Kellner and is the editor and translator of My Opposition: The Diary of Friedrich Kellner--A German against the Third Reich, Cambridge University Press, United Kingdom, 2020.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/426756

The Israel-India Counterterrorism Alliance

https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-895432

Pahalgam to Operation Sindoor: The India-Israel counterterror alliance - opinion

From the person on the street to the highest levels of leadership, Israel understands India’s need for a zero-tolerance doctrine toward terrorism — because Israel has lived it for decades.

In Israel, cross-border terrorism is a harsh and enduring reality in which  civilians are almost always the target. It comes at a high human cost, felt in the sudden rupture of ordinary life. And although Israel faces a uniquely complex security environment, this reality is not confined to the Jewish state.

Just over a year ago, in Pahalgam, India again experienced a similar pattern of violence. Terrorists from across the border in Pakistan infiltrated Indian territory and brutally murdered 26 men in front of their wives and children. It was an act of terror in its most deliberate form.

I remember that I was sitting in a café in Jerusalem last year when I heard the news. As my Israeli friends with me told me about it, their attitudes were not just of sympathy, but also of recognition. They understood instinctively why India would have to respond decisively.

From the person on the street to the highest levels of leadership, Israel understands India’s need for a zero-tolerance doctrine toward terrorism — because Israel has lived it for decades.

India’s response, via Operation Sindoor, reflected that shared reality. Addressing the nation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made it clear that the operation was not just a military action but also a national commitment to justice.

    Indian Security at site of terrorist attack

He outlined a strategy that Israelis would immediately recognize: Every terrorist attack would be met with a decisive response, and there would be no distinction made between terrorists and those who sponsored them. His words captured the shift with unmistakable clarity: “Terror and talks cannot go together… water and blood cannot flow together.”

Surgical strikes and strategic alignment

Operation Sindoor reflected a defense and security policy that Israel has refined over decades — precision over scale, intelligence-led targeting, and a constant effort to minimize civilian harm, even when enemies deliberately operate within civilian environments. 

Rather than broad escalation, India pursued calibrated, high-value strikes against terrorist infrastructure, mirroring the logic behind Israel’s own surgical operations.

This shared operational logic is clearly evident in the depth of India-Israel defense cooperation: Indian forces leveraged Israeli-origin systems central to modern precision warfare. These included the Barak-8 surface-to-air missile system, a jointly developed India-Israel platform that forms a key layer of India’s air defense across land and sea, alongside HAROP loitering munitions manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries.

The HAROP system, often described as a “kamikaze” drone, enabled highly precise strikes against designated targets, reinforcing the military policy that prioritizes accuracy and controlled escalation over indiscriminate force.

Strategic backing from Israeli officials such as Israel’s Ambassador to India Reuven Azar, along with high-level defense coordination, further underscored that this partnership is not just symbolic — it is also operational.

On the other side, Pakistani forces responded to India’s operation with Turkish-supplied systems, including Bayraktar TB2 drones and KORAL electronic warfare platforms, reflecting the deepening military alignment between Islamabad and Ankara.

Under Erdogan, Turkey has been steadily growing its partnership with Pakistan, a state with nuclear weapons. The trajectory of this relationship invites uncomfortable but necessary questions: How might India and Israel reshape regional deterrence? And what safeguards exist to prevent escalation, given the anti-Israel inflammatory rhetoric from both Pakistan and Turkey?

Water in a time of terror: The security dilemma

One of the most consequential shifts triggered by Operation Sindoor lies in India’s decision to effectively suspend the functioning of the Indus Waters Treaty, following the Pahalgam attacks. This has marked a profound turning point. 

Within its framework, India had been sharing critical hydrological data, such as river flows, snowmelt, and discharge levels, with Islamabad, concerning the rivers that flowed from Indian territory, waterways that form a vital lifeline for Pakistan’s agriculture and broader economy.

Following the 2025 attacks, India halted this data sharing and is no longer bound by many of the constraints that previously governed its use of these rivers.

In the long term, India could even divert or regulate water through canals, dams, and barrages to serve its own agricultural and strategic needs. While the immediate impact may be limited, the signal is clear: Cooperation cannot exist if it is isolated from security.

Legally, this move finds ground in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties Article 62, which allows for the suspension of treaty obligations in the event of a “fundamental change in circumstances.” Sustained cross-border terrorism fundamentally alters the conditions under which such agreements  — originally premised on goodwill and peaceful coexistence — were signed.

For Israel, this provides a relevant parallel. Even amid conflict, it continues to navigate the complex reality of water supply to Gaza.

Before October 7, only 10 percent of Gaza’s water came directly from Israel, with the rest dependent on desalination and aquifers. Today, despite the conflict, water continues to be supplied through pipelines, even though local infrastructure operates under severe constraints, with the highest risk being to civilians.

This reflects the dilemma facing India after last year’s terror attacks: How long can humanitarian resources remain separate from an ongoing security environment shaped by violence?

Water treaties between unfriendly nations are always complex, but terrorism makes them even more fragile. When life-sustaining infrastructure exists in the same space as groups that deliberately target civilians, governments are forced into difficult and often unfair choices regarding protection, continuity, and risk. Under such conditions, the boundary between humanitarian provision and security vulnerability becomes increasingly difficult to sustain.

Both Israel and India operate within these realities and are therefore frequently subjected to international scrutiny — not because of a lack of humanitarian commitment but because terrorism embeds itself in civilian environments and therefore complicates military response.

Shared challenges and lessons

Beyond optics, the India-Israel partnership is, most importantly, an operational cooperation that saves lives and enables the dismantling of terror networks. Greater awareness of this reality is essential, because it is often overshadowed by simplified narratives that go unchallenged in global discourse.

Examples are the use of terms like “genocide,” “occupation,” or the casual labeling of democratically elected leaders, such as Narendra Modi or Benjamin Netanyahu as “terrorists.”

What we have witnessed in the last two and a half years is a battlefield that is just as powerful as any: the information war.

Despite clear similarities between India and Israel in terms of threats and responses, global reactions differ sharply. Israel faces sustained criticism over the “Palestine” issue, while India’s actions against Pakistan-based terrorism have drawn comparatively less sustained outrage.

As Soraya Deen, a prominent Muslim voice against antisemitism,has argued, the Palestinian cause has now taken on the role of “sixth pillar of Islam,” capable of mobilizing mass sentiment across the world.

But another factor may also be at play: India has been effective in the information domain, communicating the operational success of Operation Sindoor with a focus on strategic outcomes rather than sensationalism, while simultaneously exposing Pakistan-based disinformation networks and strengthening public resilience through media literacy initiatives that help citizens identify and resist fake news.

That is where Israel needs to go next. Intelligence and defense technology are no longer enough if they are not accompanied by clarity in communication.

India and Israel today stand on parallel paths. Both face adversaries that exploit civilians, use human shields, and operate across borders. Both have security and response principles that emphasize surgical strikes, deterrence, and minimizing civilian harm. And both understand that this is not a battle they can fight alone.

Greater intelligence sharing with allies in Europe and the United States, as well as a unified approach to countering terrorism — physically and in the information domain —  are essential.

Ultimately, Modi’s words are not just a statement of policy but a reflection of reality: Water and blood cannot flow together. The real question is whether the world is willing to confront why this happens so often — and why those who fight it are judged by different standards.

https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-895432

New Weapon against Hezbollah Drones

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/426613

IDF unveils new response to Hezbollah drone threat

The IDF has developed a new operational response to the growing threat of drones, aiming to improve detection and interception capabilities against aerial attacks.

The IDF is preparing to deploy a new weapon in southern Lebanon to counter Hezbollah’s drone (UAV) threats.

According to a report by Kan News, the system consists of 5.56mm fragmenting ammunition compatible with the M-16 and Tavor assault rifles used by IDF soldiers in the field.

Each round contains five small steel pellets designed to increase the effective hit radius against drones by about 30 meters. The new ammunition is expected to significantly improve the chances of striking airborne targets and has previously proven effective on the battlefield during the Russia-Ukraine war.

In recent days, a delegation from the IDF Ground Forces Command traveled to the US to conduct tests of the weapon system. Following successful trials, the commander of the Ground Forces instructed the purchase of hundreds of thousands of ammunition crates from the US, which are expected to arrive in Israel next week.

The report also noted that the IDF aims to equip every soldier in relevant units with a magazine containing the special fragmenting rounds, enabling rapid fire against drones using standard personal weapons.

Alongside this procurement, additional field instructions have been issued to soldiers for dealing with drones, including the deployment of nets over buildings and military vehicles.

The combination of specialized ammunition and physical protection measures in the field is intended to reduce the effectiveness of Hezbollah’s drones in combat operations in southern Lebanon.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/426613

U.S. Politics: Attempted White House dinner assassin seeks to downgrade from prison suicide precautions

Attempted White House dinner assassin seeks to downgrade from prison suicide precautions

Allen was assigned a "safe cell," described as a padded room with 24-hour lockdown procedures.

By Reuters, May 3, 2026

https://www.jpost.com/american-politics/article-894908

Cole Tomas Allen, a suspect in the White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA) dinner shooting,

sits in the courtroom during a hearing after being charged with attempting to assassinate U.S. President 

Donald Trump, in Washington DC (photo credit: REUTERS/Emily Goff TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY)

Attorneys for the man accused of attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump at a black-tie press gala last weekend asked a judge on Saturday to remove him from suicide precautions while in jail in Washington.

Cole Tomas Allen allegedly stormed a security checkpoint and fired a shotgun outside the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 25.

When he was initially booked into the jail facility on April 27, Allen was assigned a "safe cell," described as a padded room with 24-hour lockdown procedures and a requirement to wear "a vest akin to a strait jacket," according to a filing by his lawyers in the US District Court for the District of Columbia.

He was then downgraded to "suicide precautions," which means Allen could still not make phone calls, receive visits from anyone aside from his legal team, or spend time outside his cell except for legal visits or showers, with an escort, the filing states. A nurse on Friday recommended those precautions be ended, but they remained in place as of a visit by one of his public defense lawyers that day, the filing states.

U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro points at a picture of a shotgun carried by Cole Tomas Allen, the suspect in the shooting incident in Washington at the annual White House Correspondents' Association dinner (credit: Reuters/Kylie Cooper)

A padded room with 24-hour lockdown procedures

Allen's status "amounts to punishment" and denies him resources such as the use of a jail tablet, "which would permit him to communicate with loved ones outside of the jail," the filing states.

Allen is charged with attempted assassination, discharging a firearm during a crime of violence, and illegally transporting guns and ammunition across state lines. He has not yet entered a plea.

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Lag Ba'Omer Historical Incident 1942

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/426536

Lag Ba'Omer with the Jewish Amazons at the pyramids

The little known story of how in May 1942, dozens of Jewish soldiers lit a Lag Ba'Omer bonfire in the shadow of the pyramids, dancing and singing in honor of Rashbi and Jewish independence.

By Dr. Rafael Medoff

On the outskirts of Cairo, on a blistering hot afternoon in May 1942, British Army chaplain Rabbi Louis Rabinowitz ordered the driver of his military transport truck to pull over for a group of uniformed women who were hitchhiking.

"We want to go as far as the Pyramids," one of the women explained. "Her accent betrays that she is not English, and instantly I realize that they are the Jewish Palestinian A.T.S. [volunteers in the British armed forces], the first Jewish Amazons in history!," the rabbi later recalled. "With a grin, I lapse into Hebrew." (Imagine the women's surprise!) " 'I shall be very glad indeed to take you,' I say."

It would be the most remarkable Lag Ba'Omer he would ever experience.

Thirty thousand Jewish men and 4,350 Jewish women from Mandatory Palestine volunteered to serve in the British Army during World War Two. Although horrified by the British White Paper that cut off most Jewish immigration to the Holy Land, they were anxious to take part in the Allies' war effort against the Nazis.

The women served in units known as the Palestine Auxiliary Territorial Service (A.T.S.) and some were assigned to British positions in Egypt where, along with their male comrades, they played important roles in bolstering the British fight to halt General Rommel's advance across North Africa.

One of the most famous missions carried out by these Palestinian Jewish soldiers is described in the 1943 book The Forgotten Ally, by the renowned journalist (and Christian Zionist) Pierre van Paassen. Twenty soldiers who were German Jewish refugees donned German military uniforms and, with their flawless accents, managed to infiltrate Nazi lines in western Egypt. When their true identities were discovered, the saboteurs opened fire on the enemy and, according to the sole survivor, managed to kill more than one hundred Germans.

The women hitchhikers for whom Rabbi Rabinowitz stopped were on their way to meet up with comrades at the pyramids for a Lag Ba'Omer celebration. "The Galilean village of Meron [site of the most famous Lag Ba'Omer festivities] transported to Gizeh," the rabbi marveled, "and Palestinian songs and dances in the shades of the Pyramids."

They arrived to find dozens of young Jewish soldiers igniting a huge bonfire. "Round and round they danced the Horah with increasing enthusiasm and tempo," the rabbi recalled. " 'Ben Yohai!,' 'El Yivne Hagalil!', 'Anu Olim Artzah!' The flames throw the eager, laughing, joyous aces into vivid relief. From time to time, a figure would detach itself from the whirling circle, and with an ecstatic cry of triumph would leap high over the burning pile, to land safely and triumphantly on the other side."

Standing there in the silhouette of the Pyramids, Rabbi Rabinowitz was moved to offer a Dvar Torah with a message that uniquely linked past to present:

"I spoke of Bar Kochba and of Rabbi Akiva, of his disciple, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai, who is so intimately connected with Lag Ba'Omer; of [Bar Kochba's] war for Jewish independence; of the long and weary exile of the Jewish people; of the significant fact that from that time we had not until the present day seen Palestinian Jews enrolled and organized to fight for the freedom of humanity and their own future."

But the connection to Pharaoh, builder of the pyramids, was even more significant, he said. Pharaoh, after all, had ordered the murder of all Jewish male babies for fear they would grow up to be soldiers who would turn against him; but he let the Jewish female babies live. "What possible military value could there be in women?," the Egyptian ruler reasoned. Surely girls posed no threat of becoming Jewish fighters. "And now, 4,000 years after," Rabbi Rabinowitz declared, "these Palestinian A.T.S. were showing, in no uncertain way, within sight of these Pyramids," that they too could fight for the Jewish nation. These "Jewish Amazons," as the rabbi proudly called them, were living proof of the failure of the enemies of the Jewish people.

"As I left them that evening," he later wrote, "my mind was filled with the vivid conviction--these mighty Pyramids will crumble to dust before the Jewish people will perish."

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/426536

Expansion of Israeli Air Force

 https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-894916

Israel to double its number of F-35 fighter jets with 100 new aircraft

The NIS 350 billion deal resolves the debate over which plane to invest in, resulting in a much larger budget to cover both.

Israel announced a blockbuster decision to double the size of its F-35 fleet from 50 to 100 and its new F-15IA fleet from 25 to 50.

The decision reflects a radical post-October 7 world: Israel will increase defense spending over the next 10 years by NIS 350 billion, in addition to annual defense spending that has risen from under NIS 100 billion to nearly NIS 150 billion.

If before October 7 and even mid-war there was a hot debate whether to spend Israel's limited military funds on increasing its F-35 fleet or new F-15IA fleet, after two Iran wars over the last year in which the IDF heavily using both existing F-35s and older F-15s, which need to be replaced with the new F-15IAs, the government decided to massively increase the budget in order to purchase both.

Due to the extreme expense of each of these aircraft, such a scenario had not even been imagined in the recent past.

A statement by the Defense Ministry said that the Ministerial Committee on Procurement plans to simultaneously acquire two new fighter squadrons: a fourth F-35 squadron from Lockheed Martin and a second F-15IA squadron from Boeing. 

    F-35

The government decided to massively increase the budget in order to purchase both

The deals, valued at tens of billions of NIS, include full fleet integration into the Israeli Air Force, comprehensive sustainment, spare parts, and logistics support.

Until now, Israel has had around 50 F-35s, with several new F-35s being delivered over the last year.

This is a major step in executing the IDF’s decade-long force buildup plan, approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu under the future-focused NIS 350 billion, versus the year-to-year IDF concerns budgets.

Defense Minister Israel Katz and Director-General Maj. Gen. (Res.) Amir Baram brought the procurement before the Committee as part of the ministry’s "broader strategy to strengthen readiness ahead of a demanding decade for Israeli security. The new squadrons will serve as a cornerstone of the IDF’s long-term force development, addressing evolving regional threats and preserving Israel’s strategic air superiority."

Following the Committee’s approval, Baram directed the ministry's Mission to the US to move forward with finalizing the agreements with the American government and military counterparts in the coming period.

Katz stated, "Operation Roaring Lion once again demonstrated the Israeli Air Force’s power and its decisive role in protecting Israel. The lessons of that campaign require us to keep pressing forward on force buildup, to ensure air superiority for decades to come.

"Israel is stronger than ever, and Israel must always be much stronger than our enemies," Netanyahu said following the announcement of the deal. "Our pilots can reach anywhere in Iran's skies, and they are prepared to do so if required. We have great aircraft, and we have great pilots."

He noted that NIS 350 billion would be added to Israel's defense budget in the coming decade, in order to "ensure Israel's supremacy in all arenas."

The F-35 and F-15IA acquisitions are central to the ‘Shield of Israel’ plan, which is designed to give the IDF a lasting qualitative edge. As part of this plan, the Israeli Air Force will be expected to lead a major technological leap - integrating autonomous flight capabilities, next-generation defense systems, and establishing Israeli military dominance, both defensive and offensive, in space."

Baram said, “The approval of this procurement is the first major step in executing the 350-billion-NIS force buildup plan for an intense security decade ahead. Alongside immediate wartime procurement needs, we have a responsibility to act now to secure the IDF’s military edge ten years from now and beyond...The complementary capabilities of these two squadrons will give the Israeli Air Force the flexibility to handle a broad range of combat scenarios."

Netanyahu and outgoing Air Force Chief Maj. Gen. Tomer Bar both praised the move and said that this would help Israel go forward with increasing its power and independence in fighting wars.

The prime minister added a vague statement that Israel could produce its own aircraft, but his spokesman had not responded at press time on what this might mean, and Israel closed its last attempt to build its own fighter jets in the 1980s after a decade of huge financial losses.

In mid-January, the IDF announced that three F-35i aircraft had landed at Nevatim Air Force Base, purchased from US defense giant Lockheed Martin, bringing Israel's total to 48 of 50, all of which have already been purchased.

These three aircraft were part of a long-standing deal spread over several years to expand Israel's fleet from 25 to 50 F-35s.

These aircraft were originally due in late 2025 but were delayed; the last two are still due for delivery later in 2026.

But that is not the end of F-35 deliveries.

In 2023, Israel, the US government, and Lockheed Martin signed a deal for 25 additional F-35s, eventually raising the number of aircraft to 75, which will mean a third squadron. Additional steps in that process took place in mid-2024.

Previously, The Jerusalem Post was told that the first third squadron F-35 deliveries would start in 2027

Israel signed on to the F-35 program in 2010, and its F-35 program became operational in 2017.

By early 2025, the F-35 had already undertaken over 15,000 flight hours on all fronts of the war, which Israel was coping with, from Iran to Yemen to Syria to Lebanon to Gaza.

More specifically, the F-35 was Israel's key first component in eliminating Iran's best radars and air defenses in four rounds of attacks, including in the June 2025 and the 2026 Israel-Iran wars.

In addition, over the course of the war, the IDF said it modified its F-35 aircraft to fire JDAM munitions from their wings, rather than dropping them from the aircraft's belly as originally designed.

Even before the war, the F-35 was considered crucial in the MABAM “war between wars” against Iranian proxies in Syria.

It has stealth technology, which makes it better able to strike targets throughout the Middle East with impunity, and its surveillance and intelligence capabilities far exceed those of Israel’s older F-16 and F-15 aircraft.

For example, it is said to be easily capable of outwitting Iran’s S-300 anti-aircraft missile defense system, and possibly even the S-400 system, whereas other Israeli aircraft would have more trouble.

Lockheed Martin Israel's former CEO Joshua (Shiki) Shani has previously said, “We are proud to support the Israel Defense Forces in providing the F-35, and honored that the Israeli government has announced its intent to purchase additional F-35s.

“The Israel Air Force has proven its capabilities in critical operations with the 116 and 140 Squadrons, and we are looking forward to building on this strong performance. With a combination of stealth, sensor fusion, and electronic warfare, the fifth-generation F-35 will ensure the Israel Air Force stays ahead of current and evolving threats,” he said.

At the same time, Israel has made parallel advances and investments in the air force’s future.

Months ago, after years of delay, the Defense Ministry began moving forward with the purchase of 25 F-15IA Boeing fighters from the US to help replace its aging F-15 aircraft.

This latest announcement means that Israel will eventually have 50 F-15IA aircraft.

"Eventually" could mean as late as the early or mid 2030s.

According to public information, Israel has around 70 aging F-15s and over 100 F-16s.

While it is necessary to replace the F-15s sooner, given that many of them date back to the 1970s, the ministry announced in January that it would upgrade its F-16 fleet with an NIS 80 million upgrade to more advanced self-protection systems, rather than replacing them.

Purchased in the early 2000s, the F-16s were fourth-generation aircraft intended as an upgrade for Israel over the F-15s, which were purchased decades earlier.

The F-35s are Israel's fifth-generation aircraft.

Collectively, the plan appears to be to eventually have 100 F-35s, over 100 enhanced F-16s, and at least 50 newer F-15UAs, with possibly some older F-15s continuing, if they are considered able.

Separately, in November 2022, Israel finalized an agreement to purchase four Boeing KC-46A midair-refueling aircraft.

Each of those new aircraft elements is also some years from being delivered to Israel, but would also eventually boost Jerusalem’s capability for attacking Tehran and other adversaries.

https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-894916