https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/iran-news/article-890325
https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-890509
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/defense-news/article-890536
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/424314
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/424303
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/424296
Iranian cluster missile fragments strike central Israel
A cluster missile fired from Iran triggers sirens across central Israel, Jerusalem and surrounding regions. Fragments damage vehicles and strike several sites; no injuries reported.
A cluster missile was fired from Iran towards Israeli territory on Friday evening, triggering sirens in central Israel, Jerusalem, the Shfela, Samaria and Sharon regions.
No injuries were reported, but security forces were summoned to the scene of several impact sites.
In the city of Elad, vehicles were damaged after fragments fell in the courtyard of a residential building, while in Kiryat Ono, an impact was identified in a public garden, causing a crater in the ground.
Fragments also fell on Highway 4, in the area of the Mesubim interchange.
The IDF said that Home Front Command Search and Rescue forces are on their way to the impact sites in central Israel, asking the public to avoid gathering in these areas.
Sirens also sounded several times in northern Israel on Friday evening, due to UAV infiltrations from Lebanon. No reports of impacts or injuries were received.
A serious incident was narrowly avoided earlier on Friday in Rehovot, when a shrapnel fragment struck a soccer field while a children’s practice was taking place.
A siren was sounded during the practice following warnings of rocket launches from Iran. The children and coaches acted quickly, running to a nearby shelter. No one was injured but the field itself sustained a direct hit from the shrapnel.
Also on Friday, interception debris struck the Old City of Jerusalem, not far from the Temple Mount and Al-Aqsa Mosque.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/424314
Miracle in Rehovot: Shrapnel fragment falls on soccer field while children practicing
During a children’s team practice in Rehovot, an alarm sounded following warnings of rocket launches from Iran. The children and coaches rushed to a nearby protected shelter.
A serious incident was narrowly avoided today (Friday) in Rehovot when a shrapnel fragment struck a soccer field in the Sha’arayim neighborhood-while a children’s practice was taking place.
During the practice, an alarm was triggered following warnings of rocket launches from Iran. The children and coaches acted quickly, running to a nearby protected shelter, and miraculously no one was injured.
However, the field itself sustained a direct hit from the shrapnel.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/424303
Report of a shrapnel landing in Jerusalem's Jewish Quarter
Eight waves of Iranian rockets struck across Israel this morning, with debris from interceptions hitting Rehovot and Haifa’s port, as well as the Jewish Quarter in Jerusalem.
Sirens were heard in Jerusalem around 16:00 following an Iranian missile launch toward various locations in Israel.
Magen David Adom reported no injuries, though interception debris struck several locations, including the Jewish Quarter in Jerusalem.
One of the missiles was a fragmentation missile.
In one of the barrages, several buildings in the city of Rehovot were damaged, and two people were lightly injured.
The Mayor of Rehovot commented at the scene of the strike in the city: "An elderly man was in the house, and he doesn't have a protected space. A missile fragment fell and did not hit him. We evacuated him, he is lightly injured. He is a bit confused, but he is okay."
On Friday morning, a home in Rehovot suffered a missile strike, but the residents, who had entered the bomb shelter, were uninjured.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/424296
Israeli medics confront new battlefield: Cluster warheads
Emergency responders describe the operational chaos, toxic hazards, and psychological strain facing civilians and rescuers as Iran’s missile attacks evolve.
Speaking with The Media Line, Rafalowski explained that the current phase of the war has forced rescue organizations to adapt rapidly to a threat that creates numerous simultaneous emergencies rather than a single blast site.
Living in constant war
Magen David Adom (MDA), Israel’s national emergency medical service, has been operating under wartime conditions for more than two years. The escalation following the latest round of attacks, however, has introduced complications that responders say they have rarely encountered at this scale. "We need to remember that Magen David Adom, as the whole Israeli population, is living a war situation for the last two and a half years," Rafalowski said.
"It’s another wave of increased violence that started on October 7, and we are living in a constant war since October 7."
What makes the current attacks particularly challenging, he said, is the widespread use of cluster munitions. According to Israeli defense assessments cited by Rafalowski, more than half of the missiles fired toward Israel now carry warheads that disperse multiple smaller bombs while still in the air and can cover a large geographical area.
"The missile itself comes with a very large number of smaller bombs," he explained. "It opens somewhere in midair and spreads the smaller bombs. Each and every one of them is around two and a half kilograms."
Instead of responding to one impact site, emergency teams may suddenly face incidents scattered across neighborhoods and towns. "They spread over about 10 kilometers," Rafalowski said. "So one such missile will give us scenes where the cluster bombs landed in many places. We are talking about 10, 12 scenes where the cluster bombs landed and exploded."
For emergency services, that means dividing personnel, ambulances, and equipment across numerous locations at once while still racing to reach victims before additional explosions occur.
The complexity of the response is not only logistical, but also dangerous for the responders themselves. Bomblets that fail to detonate immediately can explode later, turning impact zones into unpredictable environments. "This is a great operational challenge," Rafalowski said. "At the same time, it’s a great safety issue for our personnel because they might step on something that could explode."
Simmy Allen, international spokesperson for United Hatzalah, described a similar evolution in the threats confronting volunteer medics across the country. Speaking with The Media Line, Allen said the change in Iranian missile technology has forced emergency responders to rethink how they approach impact zones.
"We’ve seen the escalation, the difference between the first missiles that came over from Iran to now these cluster bombs, these cluster missiles with multiple detonation warheads that pose a much different threat," he said. "Not only a different threat to property, but also a very different threat to lives because a detonation could be delayed and could cause further damage and loss of life."
United Hatzalah volunteers have responded to impacts across Israel since the first missile launches of the current operation. According to Allen, the scattered nature of cluster warheads creates debris fields that extend across wide areas and can remain dangerous long after the initial explosion. "We’ve seen projectile impacts, what we call shrapnel from the various missiles and from interception debris, falling over very large geographic locations," he said.
The threat does not disappear once the explosions stop. Both emergency organizations say unexploded fragments and missile debris can continue to endanger civilians who approach them. Rafalowski noted that public awareness about these dangers remains limited.
"Unfortunately, people are not well educated," he said. "We have had incidents of the general public picking up those cluster bombs." In one case earlier in the day, he said, a civilian picked up a piece of missile debris and suffered burns. "Luckily, it was a minor injury, but it could have been way, way worse."
'No one knows how dangerous they are'
Allen said United Hatzalah has repeatedly urged the public to stay away from missile fragments and to wait for trained personnel. "No one knows what is inside them. No one knows how dangerous they are," he said. "When people see shrapnel or a projectile, they should keep their distance and alert the authorities."
Alongside the explosives themselves, responders are now facing another unexpected danger: hazardous chemicals released when parts of missiles land intact. One such incident occurred recently in northern Israel when a missile engine fell near the city of Safed.
Rafalowski explained that the fuel used in these missiles can pose a serious toxic threat to anyone nearby. "The fuel of these missiles is highly toxic," he said. "In our terminology, we call this a hazmat incident."
In the incident in Safed, Rafalowski said responders quickly realized they were not dealing only with debris but with a hazardous chemical release from the missile’s engine.
"People who inhale nitric acid fumes will suffer from very severe burns to their airway and lungs," Rafalowski said. "And, of course, there can also be skin irritation."
For medical teams, hazardous material incidents require a completely different operational approach. Instead of rushing directly toward casualties, responders must first identify the chemical risk and coordinate with other emergency agencies.
"The most important thing is to identify it really fast and make sure civilians are away," Rafalowski said. Firefighters typically manage containment of the chemical hazard, while police secure the scene and medical teams treat potential victims.
Despite the scale of the attacks, the number of fatalities remains relatively limited compared with what many analysts initially feared. According to figures cited by Rafalowski, hospitals across Israel have treated more than 3,000 people since the current escalation began. "So far, the Healthy Ministry reports 3,079 people who have been treated at hospitals," he said. "Among them, 16 were killed."
Some of those deaths occurred from direct missile impacts, while others were indirect consequences of the emergency conditions. Rafalowski described one case involving an elderly man who was injured while trying to reach shelter during an alert. "One of them is a 90-year-old gentleman who fell on his way to the shelter, suffered a severe head injury, and died," he said. "Some of them died during car accidents that occurred during the alerts."
Most of the people treated by emergency teams have not suffered life-threatening injuries, Rafalowski said, but the numbers still illustrate the scale of the attacks. Nineteen people were classified as severely injured and 71 as moderately injured, while nearly 3,000 others were treated for minor injuries or anxiety reactions linked to the repeated missile alerts across the country.
Allen said the relatively low number of severe casualties reflects the discipline of the Israeli public in following civil defense guidelines. "The Israeli public, even on day 18 of the war, is holding very strictly to the guidelines of the Home Front Command," he said. "Those guidelines have been proven to literally save lives."
Psychological toll of missile attacks
Yet the psychological toll of living under repeated missile attacks is becoming increasingly visible. Allen said the entire population is operating under constant pressure as sirens interrupt daily life and force people to repeatedly rush to shelters. "The population has been under constant stress," he said. "The entire country is on edge."
That anxiety often manifests itself in medical emergencies, even when missiles do not strike directly. United Hatzalah responders have reported numerous cases of civilians injured while running for shelter. "We’re seeing people falling while rushing to the safe areas," Allen said. "They’re so anxious and so nervous that they’re literally falling over their own feet and suffering fractures and minor injuries."
To address those cases, United Hatzalah has expanded the deployment of its Psychotrauma and Crisis Unit, which provides emotional support and psychological first aid at impact zones and in surrounding communities. "We’ve seen an increased number of anxiety cases," Allen said, noting that the psychological dimension of the war has become an increasingly significant part of emergency response work.
Emergency responders themselves are not immune to exhaustion after years of continuous conflict. Rafalowski said the repeated missile alerts, often occurring throughout the night, are part of a strategy aimed at wearing down the population. "Everyone is tired," he said. "Clearly, the Iranian tactic is to try and exhaust people by not letting you sleep."
He described nights when alarms sound every few hours, forcing families repeatedly into shelters. "When the sirens go off every two hours, people don’t sleep well enough," he said. "Everyone is tired."
Yet for emergency workers, the alarms also trigger a different reaction: a call to action. Rafalowski explained that many MDA volunteers keep ambulances at home and respond directly from their neighborhoods. "When the alarm goes off, they put their family in the shelter, and they tell their family, ‘You stay in the shelter,’" he said. "They put on their helmet, their flak jacket, and wait for the dispatcher to call them."
MDA operates with approximately 4,000 staff members and more than 30,000 volunteers across Israel, forming one of the largest volunteer emergency networks in the world. Because of that network, responders are often able to reach an incident within minutes, even while missile alerts are still active.
Allen said United Hatzalah volunteers are operating under those conditions across the country, including in northern communities that face additional threats from rockets fired from Lebanon. "In fact, in the north, there is no warning," he said. "You hear a boom before the first siren goes off. There is zero time to seek shelter."
That reality has forced many families to alter their daily routines. "Many of them have resolved to just sleep in their safe rooms throughout the night in order to protect themselves," he said.
Despite the dangers and exhaustion, both responders said the resilience of Israeli society has been a crucial factor in preventing a larger humanitarian disaster. Rafalowski described how residents often find ways to support each other while waiting in shelters during missile alerts. "You see people sitting together, singing songs together and playing together," he said. "Sometimes people who never knew each other become friends after some nights in the shelter."
Even as the attacks continue, the ability of communities to follow safety instructions has prevented far higher casualties. "The Israeli public is holding very strictly to the guidelines," Allen said. "And those guidelines have literally saved lives."
https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/iran-news/article-890325
Iranian cluster munitions pose additional challenge for Israel's air defenses
Half of the missiles fired by Iran have been cluster warheads that have about 24 submunitions, each containing approximately 2–5 kg of explosives.
Iran has launched dozens of missiles with cluster munition warheads at Israel since the start of the war, posing a challenge for Israel's missile defense shield as they need to be hit before they split and disperse into smaller explosives.
Israel failed to intercept one of the cluster missiles overnight, and its small bomblets scattered into civilian areas in Tel Aviv. A couple in their 70s was killed, and one of Tel Aviv's main train stations suffered damage.
Israeli military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani told reporters that the couple was killed in their apartment by a single, cluster munition bomblet.
"This cluster bomb was fired by the Iranian regime towards a center of mass population, firing dozens of rockets towards the civilians, deliberately targeting civilians," he said. "This is a war crime by the Iranian regime."
Shoshani said the military was doing all it could to intercept these missiles as "high up as possible" to minimize damage.
Munitions banned by more than 100 countries
Cluster munitions open in mid-air and scatter as many as several hundred "bomblets" over a wide area. They often fail to explode, creating virtual minefields that can kill or injure anyone who finds them later.
More than 100 countries agreed at an international conference in Dublin in 2008 to ban the use of cluster munitions. However, Israel and Iran have not joined the ban, and neither have major powers including the US, China and Russia.
Israel's Home Front Command, which issues safety directives to citizens during wartime, has published videos warning of the dangers of munitions, saying they can "become dangerous explosive traps", particularly for small children or pets.
The military has said about half of the missiles fired from Iran since Israel and the US jointly attacked Iran on February 28 have been cluster warheads. They were also fired by Iran during a 12-day Israel-Iran war last June.
An Israeli military official said Iranian cluster warheads have about 24 submunitions, each containing approximately 2–5 kg of explosives. They break apart at an altitude of 7–10 km above the ground, creating dozens of separate impact sites.
"Each submunition can detonate when it hits the ground or another hard surface," the official said. "Its effect is similar to the explosion of a grenade - relatively limited local damage but highly dangerous to anyone nearby."
'Must be intercepted above the atmosphere'
Yehoshua Kalisky, a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, said most missiles are intercepted by Israel's Arrow-3 anti-ballistic missile system.
To prevent damage, "they must be intercepted above the atmosphere as far as possible from the target area," Kalisky said. "There's no other way, because once the cluster bombs are released (in the atmosphere), you cannot intercept them."
Shoshani said Israel's offensive capabilities were also crucial. Israel says it has bombed hundreds of targets in Iran, including missile launching sites. An estimated 3,000-plus people have been killed in Iran since the start of the war, according to the US-based Iran human rights group HRANA.
"We've been degrading their ability to fire missiles, (along with) active defense systems and the passive defense system, sirens and people going to the safe rooms," said Shoshani of efforts to prevent Israeli casualties from Iranian missiles.
"The combination of all that has had great success, but is still not perfect."
https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-890509
'After the cluster opens, it’s too late:' Israeli expert explains Iranian cluster warhead challenge
Dr. Uzi Rubin tells The Media Line that stopping missiles at high altitude remains the only effective defense once submunitions are released.
Rubin’s warning comes as analysts and defense officials examine the use of cluster warheads in missiles launched from Iran during the recent war with Israel. The weapons, which disperse multiple smaller bomblets instead of a single explosive payload, have drawn renewed attention from missile defense specialists.
The core challenge, Rubin said, is simple: A ballistic missile carrying a cluster warhead must be intercepted before the payload opens and releases its submunitions. Once that happens, the missile is no longer a single target, and the chance of stopping its full effect drops sharply.
Rubin, the founding director of Israel’s missile defense program and now a senior fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, led Israel’s Missile Defense Organization from 1991 to 1999, overseeing the development and deployment of the Arrow, Israel’s first national missile defense shield. He later served as senior director for proliferation and technology at Israel’s National Security Council, directed major defense programs at Israel Aerospace Industries and the Defense Ministry, and was a visiting scholar at Stanford’s Center for International Security and Arms Control. He received the Israel Defense Prize in 1996 and 2003, as well as the US Missile Defense Agency’s David Israel Prize.
What is a cluster warhead?
To explain the weapon, Rubin started with the basic concept. “What is a cluster warhead?” Rubin said. “A cluster warhead is a class of bombs, which were more famously used in the Vietnam War and other wars. It’s a bomb which contains, instead of one big barrel of explosive, it contains a lot of small bomblets.”
He then described what happens as the missile nears its target. “So a cluster warhead for a missile is the same thing,” Rubin said. “The tip of the missile, instead of containing a big barrel of explosives, contains a mechanism which holds on to a lot of small bombs. And when the missile approaches the target, it opens its skin, it peels off, and it spins around, and the bomblets are released and released into space and fall on the ground.”
Iran’s missile program includes a range of ballistic systems developed over decades, and according to Rubin, many of them can carry more than one type of warhead. “Every one of their missiles, and they have several types, heavier ones, smaller ones,” he said. “For each one of them, they have a regular warhead or a cluster warhead.” The number of submunitions varies depending on the missile and payload capacity. “Cluster warheads can contain, let’s say, from 20-30 bomblets to 70-80 bomblets; it depends on the type of the missile.”
From a defensive standpoint, timing is everything. Missile defense systems must destroy the incoming missile while the warhead is still intact. Once the cluster mechanism activates and disperses the bomblets, interception becomes far less effective because the payload has already separated.
“Interception usually is done if it’s successful,” Rubin said. “It’s not always successful. It’s above the altitude where it opens there, and it disperses the cluster, when it’s still held in one piece.”
Technical assessments suggest that the altitude at which cluster warheads disperse their payload is relatively low compared with the height reached by ballistic missiles during flight. “In the papers, they say that the opening altitude of clusters is a dispersed altitude of 7 kilometers,” Rubin said. “Seven kilometers is pretty low. Most of the interception is done above that.”
In Rubin’s view, cluster warheads do not fundamentally alter the defensive equation. The strategy remains the same as with conventional ballistic missiles: Destroy the missile as early as possible in its trajectory, well before it reaches the target area. “So, there is no difference in intercepting cluster warheads than the regular warhead,” he said. “You have to intercept them well away from the target.”
Once a missile descends below a certain altitude, interception becomes much more difficult regardless of the warhead type. “After the cluster has opened, it’s too late,” Rubin said. “But anyway, even if there’s not a cluster, a unitary bombhead, a barrel, below a certain altitude, you cannot intercept it anymore. It’s too late.”
That point also helps explain a common misconception about Israel’s missile defense network. Iron Dome is built to stop short-range rockets, while Arrow is designed to intercept long-range ballistic missiles high above Israeli territory. In other words, the system most associated internationally with Israel’s air defense is not the one meant to handle this kind of threat. “The Iron Dome is too low for that,” Rubin said. “The Iron Dome is not designed against that. It’s designed against a short-range rocket.”
Cluster warheads and conventional warheads, Rubin said, are built for different tactical effects. Cluster munitions are meant to spread damage across a wider area, making them more dangerous to exposed troops and unprotected sites. “It depends for what use,” Rubin said. “A cluster warhead is very dangerous against troops in the open, against installations which are not protected.”
By contrast, traditional warheads concentrate their destructive power in a single impact point. “A unitary warhead is more dangerous to, like you saw what happened last night in that village … that was a unitary warhead,” Rubin said.
Each bomblet is relatively small compared with the explosive payload of a ballistic missile, but the cumulative effect can still be deadly. Rubin compared the impact of the submunitions to rockets commonly fired by terrorist groups from Gaza. “No, it’s a small bomb,” he said. “The effect is like a Grad, a rocket that comes from Gaza. It can be fatal.”
Rubin said the cluster warheads used in the conflict are not a new development. Asked whether the versions used in the recent fighting differed from those launched in earlier exchanges between Iran and Israel, he gave a short answer. “Same thing,” he said. “They fired less of them, but it’s the same thing.”
For Rubin, the broader issue is not the novelty of the weapon but the narrow window for stopping it. Missile interception comes down to altitude and seconds. If the missile is destroyed early, the warhead never opens. If it is not, defense gives way to damage control.
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/defense-news/article-890536
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