The Threat to the Israeli Air Force over Gaza

The Threat to the Israeli Air Force over Gaza

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misagHamas has been taking great efforts for a while now to damage the Air Forces’ aircraft operating within the Gaza Strip. “It’s problematic to defend aircraft against small arms fire but this is only one threat” an expert said yesterday.

Breaching the border between Gaza and Egypt has allowed Hamas to enhance its arms capacity also against aerial targets. Experts said yesterday that the Hamas has still not revealed all of their ability and anti-aircraft weapons.

For a long time now, Hamas in the Gaza Strip has been trying to improve its ability in the field of anti-aircraft primarily by receiving deliveries of such weapons, which are manufactured in Iran. There is intelligence information that a number of these missiles have already reached Gaza.

The Hamas is not currently effective in using fire against the Israeli Air Force.

At the same time Hamas are working on developing and building much more advanced anti-aircraft systems. The Iranian military industry has developed in recent years some models of shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles. Experts point to one in particular, the Misag -1 which is very similar to a Chinese missile the” Vanguard “. This is a missile with a range of 5 km equipped with a warhead of 1.5 kg. The missile homes in on the heat emitted from the engine of the plane.