Projectiles over Jerusalem on October 1, 2024. Israel says Iran fired more than 180 rockets but the attack caused little damage.

MENAHEM KAHANA/AFP via Getty Images/AFP

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The Iranian attack on Israel appears to have been more effective in achieving its goals than an attack in April this year.

Videos posted on social media and geolocated by NPR and the online investigative group Bellingcat show multiple warheads landing around two Israeli air bases: Nevatim air base in the south of the country and Tel Nof air base in central Israel. A video taken near Tel Nof also appeared to show possible secondary explosions, suggesting ammunition or fuel could have been hit by a missile.

Videos also showed warheads landing in northern Tel Aviv, near the headquarters of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency. These warheads appear to have missed their target and caused no real damage. A video showed a large crater about 500 meters from the intelligence agency's headquarters.

According to experts, the attack was slightly more successful than the one in April this year, which was almost completely neutralized by Israeli and American air defenses.

“It looks like more missiles are hitting targets in Israel this time,” said Jeffrey Lewis, a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey. That could be partly because “the Iranians appear to be using newer, more sophisticated missiles.”

US calls attacks “ineffective”

Both the US and Israel downplayed the attacks. “This attack appears to have been repelled and ineffective,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in a briefing Tuesday. The US said it fired about a dozen warship interceptors to blunt the Iranian attack.

According to reports in Israeli media, the military acknowledged that “several” air bases were damaged as a result of the attack. However, it was said that no aircraft were destroyed. Israeli media reported that the attacks primarily damaged maintenance areas and office buildings.

An Israel Defense Forces spokesman declined to comment to NPR about casualties or damage as a result of the attack. Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner said in a briefing on the social media platform

While the damage it caused was limited, it posed a clear challenge to Israel's vaunted air defense systems. Israel's main system, called Iron Dome, has proven incredibly effective at blocking rockets from nearby adversaries such as the militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah. Iron Dome uses relatively inexpensive interceptor missiles along with state-of-the-art radars and high-speed computers to quickly determine which incoming missiles pose a threat. It only shoots those it detects crashing in populated areas.

Better rockets and more of them

But ballistic missiles from Iran fly much higher and faster than those fired from nearby Lebanon and Gaza. The missiles fly briefly into space before impacting their targets at near or supersonic speeds. Israel has a separate missile defense system called Arrow that is capable of intercepting missiles near or in space, but Arrow has fewer interceptor missiles than Iron Dome.

A man takes photos of a destroyed building hit in the Iranian missile attack in Hod Hasharon, Israel, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)

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Ariel Schalit/AP/AP

When Iran attacked Israel in April, it used about 100 ballistic missiles in conjunction with about 200 low-flying drones and cruise missiles, according to Yehoshua Kalisky, a senior researcher at the Institute for National Strategic Studies in Tel Aviv, Israel. The drones and cruise missiles were easily shot down by fighter jets, leaving the missiles to Arrow, he says.

This time, Iran fired around 180 ballistic missiles, putting more strain on the Arrow system. “Working for the Arrow was a lot easier (in April),” he said.

In addition, images of the missiles fired from Iran, as well as images of debris falling in Israel, suggest that more sophisticated ballistic missiles were used, Lewis says.

According to Lewis, Iran used primarily liquid-fired missiles in the April attack, which were relatively inaccurate. Half of the missiles fell more than half a mile from their targets. “With that level of accuracy, it’s pretty hard to destroy anything,” he says.

In this latest attack, Iran used new solid-fuel rockets that are more precise, he says. Lewis and other researchers say at least some of the missiles used appear to be Iran's newest design, the Fattah, an intermediate-range ballistic missile that could have some maneuverability as it enters the atmosphere, allowing it to change course and dodging interceptor missiles.

Lewis says he believes Iran's latest attack was aimed at demonstrating some restraint. He noted that the warheads primarily struck air bases that may have been used in the attacks on Hezbollah's leadership last week. “It is very typical for Iranians to select military targets that are related to the military strike they are responding to,” he says.

The attack also appeared to largely avoid civilian areas. The only publicly known death in the attack so far was a Palestinian in the West Bank who was apparently hit by a falling rocket. A school in central Israel was also hit, but no injuries were reported.

Despite trying to control the escalation, Israel is likely to respond with force, says Tom Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. After the attack in April, Israel disabled an air defense radar near Iran's nuclear facilities in Natanz, he points out. This limited attack was intended to send a message: “The Israelis can invade Iranian airspace, they have proven that time and time again,” he says. “They can harm Iran.”

Israel's military spokesman Peter Lerner suggested it was only a matter of time before the country retaliated directly against Iran. “A ballistic missile is an unacceptable reality for any sovereign state,” he told reporters. “One hundred and eighty means there will be consequences.”