Iran launched dozens of drones directly from its territory against Israel on Saturday night, in a radical change from its usual use of proxies, the IDF has confirmed.
The military said that it is ready to shoot them down, though air defense is not hermetic.
The IDF’s shoot-down capabilities include aircraft, Iron Dome, David’s Sling, and the Arrow missile system.
In addition, the military can use GPS scrambling to disable certain kinds of attacking drones.
The drone attacks could take hours or more to arrive in Israel while traveling across such potential countries as Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and other areas.
There are concerns that Tehran or its proxies may also fire long-range ballistic missiles and other rockets at Israel in some kind of overlapping wave with the drone attacks.
The Islamic Republic’s attack comes after it accused Israel of killing top Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Muhammad Reza Zehidi on April 1, who had directed its proxy attacks on Israel in Lebanon and Syria, including being a top coordinator with Hezbollah.
The IDF declined to publicly commit to a preemptive strike on Iran now that the drones have been launched.
The Israel Airports Authority announced that Israeli airspace would close starting at 12:30 a.m. local time.
Shortly after the Iranian strike began, Iraqi officials announced that Iraqi airspace was being closed.
