Gulf states want Iron Dome anti-rocket system

Several Gulf nations are now in negotiations to purchase the Israeli-made Iron Dome missile defense system, Sky News reported on Tuesday.

Israeli sources claim that this includes weapons capable of precision attacks on any target inside the Jewish state as well as up to 100,000 other missiles of less capability and accuracy which have been accumulated to try to overwhelm the Iron Dome and other systems with Iranian funds and supplies.

Bahrain’s foreign minister, Khalid bin Mohammed, told the channel that the members of the Gulf Cooperation Council, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait, are interested in purchasing the Israeli weapon for the entire council. About 90 percent of the rockets that were fired into Israeli population centers were intercepted by the Iron Dome in the 2014 war, up from 85 percent in the 2012 conflict between Israel and the terror group. Its interception range will be longer, similar to that of David’s Sling, also jointly developed by Rafael and Raytheon, which is created to intercept medium and long-range rockets. The deal could be worth hundreds of billions of dollars, and the technology would likely be set up to defend a number of countries.

A few years ago, the sale of weapons developed in Israel would have been far more controversial, but these days, both the Gulf states and Israeli citizens and officials consider Iran a significant military threat.

“Iran has been trying to undermine and topple government in our region for years”, the Bahraini foreign minister said. During Israel’s most recent flare-up with Palestinian terror group Hamas, the Iron Dome intercepted a remarkably high percentage of incoming rockets, saving countless civilians in the process.

Saudi Arabia reportedly rejected the offer, according to the London-based newspaper.