Israel’s successful interception of over 300 Iranian missiles on Saturday night likely cost over $1 billion dollars.
In an interview with Ynet, Re’em Aminoach, a former head of the budget department at the Defense Ministry, detailed the expenses involved in missile defense systems. He explained that each Arrow 2 and 3 interceptor used against 120 Iranian ballistic missiles cost about $3.5 million. During the attack, Iran also deployed about 170 explosive drones and 30 cruise missiles, which were countered using Israel’s David’s Sling defense system, with each interceptor costing approximately $1 million dollars. Aminoach suggested that UAVs were probably countered using planes, with hundreds of air-to-air missiles deployed.
“Then add up the costs,” Aminoach said. “$3.5m for an Arrow missile, $1m for a David’s Sling, such and such costs for airplanes. An order of magnitude of 4-5bn shekels, that’s the size of the bill.”
However, Israel didn’t bear all that cost alone, as it was mitigated somewhat by the support of international allies such as the United States, Great Britain, and France, who aided in downing many of the missiles, either through their own jet fighters or interceptors launched from naval destroyers.
