Iron Dome nearly 99% effective against incoming missiles, maker Rafael's chairman says

TEL AVIV - Israel's Iron Dome has been nearly 99% effective against missiles from Hamas and Hezbollah militants and has knocked out most missiles from Iran, the chairman of state-owned Iron Dome maker Rafael Advanced Defense Systems Ltd said on Monday.

Rafael's Yuval Steinitz told a conference of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs that since the October 2023 Hamas raid on Israel, Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon combined have fired some 40,000 rockets at Israel.

"Iron Dome intercepted most of them with success rates that (are) not 100% but close to 100%. It's around 98%, even 99%, so it's not perfect, but almost," Steinitz said.

Iran, he said, has fired about 1,500 ballistic missiles at Israel in two rounds of fighting since 2024 and "only several dozens" were not intercepted.

He noted that there was no shortage of missile interceptors.

(Reporting by Steven Scheer; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

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This story was originally published May 11, 2026 at 3:36 AM.