The IDF on Sunday revealed the full story of how the Houthis’s Samad 3 drone traveled 2,600 kilometers and penetrated Israel’s multi-tiered air defense system, killing one person and wounding around a dozen in Tel Aviv on Friday.According to the IDF, the drone left Yemen, flying west toward Sudan.It then turned north, flying through Sudan for an extended period until reaching southern Egypt.From southern Egypt, it continued to fly north, all the way until it reached the Sinai, and then cut east into the Mediterranean Sea.
From the Mediterranean Sea, the Houthi drone continued to travel east, cutting slightly south to strike Tel Aviv when it got closer to the Israeli coastline.
Although Yemen is nominally 1,800 kilometers from Israel, the deceptive path that the Houthis selected for the drone led it to travel much farther, at 2,600 kilometers for a period of around 16 hours.
Identifying a blip on the screen
The IDF said that Iran and the Houthis replaced the original standard engine of the Samad 3 to allow it to travel the extra distance and better deceive Israel with its trajectory.The drone traveled 80-100 kilometers per hour during its 16-hour tour, the IDF said.When it was relatively far out over the Mediterranean from Tel Aviv, a portion of Israel’s radar defenses picked it up as a blip on the air defense screen. However, the soldier observing that monitor either missed the blip entirely or dismissed it as a mere blip, given the numerous false blips over the past nine months.In addition, the IDF said that a drone attacking from Israel’s opposite eastern border appeared on the same radar screen around the same time, suggesting that the Houthis might have set the radar operator up with a simultaneous distraction.Although the IDF did not provide an exact explanation for the radar operator’s failure, it made it clear that it was not considered a significantly unprofessional miss, but rather a low-grade error that, given the circumstances, could have happened to almost any operator.Moving forward, the IDF did say that it was doubling the number of radar operators so that at least two sets of eyes would be watching, which should double the chance of properly identifying these threats.When the drone was only five minutes away, the air defense and warning systems finally recognized it as a threat.Despite Houthi claims that changes they made to the drone made it undetectable to Israeli systems, the IDF said that was not the case.Instead, despite the drone’s adjustments to use longer wings and carbon fiber to make it harder to detect, Israeli radar systems successfully detected it. However, human error – failure to flag the blip as dangerous – allowed the drone to penetrate Tel Aviv.The IDF said it has succeeded in shooting down the vast majority of around 1,000 drones sent against it from several distinct fronts throughout the nine-month war, but nevertheless, even its multi-tiered air defense is not hermetic.Moreover, the military said that Israel’s enemies have tried many times to attack both Ashdod and Haifa with drones, but until now, they have been shot down.Israel shot down 40 out of 50 Hamas drones and dozens from Yemen, while the US shot down most of the remaining 300 drones sent by the Houthis to attack Israel, according to the IDF. Furthermore, the military reported that Israel has successfully shot down approximately 80 out of 200 Iranian drones, while the US has shot down most others or caused them to crash prematurely.The IDF views all those fronts as successful defenses, with the exception of the Lebanon-Syria front, where it has only shot down 150 out of 300 drones, with more of those drones hitting Israeli targets and causing both physical and financial harm.To keep up with this incredible workload, the Israel Air Force said that 40% of its personnel are now assigned to air defense roles.The IDF expects to see more attempts by Yemen to strike Israel, such as the ballistic missile fired at Eilat on Sunday morning. However, it was unclear how intense these attacks would be or if they would be limited to the Eilat attacks, which have nearly all failed and caused no deaths to date.It was also unclear to what extent the IDF would continue to attack Yemen to deter it from future drone strikes like the one on Tel Aviv.Finally, it was unclear whether Yemen’s drone strike would lead to a more direct escalation between Israel and Iran, which unleashed the Houthis on Israel.But the sense on Sunday from the IDF was that such a direct escalation was not imminent.