Report: Missile fired in alleged Israeli strike on Iran had tech to evade radar detection

A Russian-made S-300 air defense system is carried on a truck during Army Day parade at a military base in northern Tehran, Iran, April 17, 2024. (AP/Vahid Salemi)

Two Western officials tell The New York Times that a missile fired in an alleged Israeli strike on air defenses of the Natanz nuclear site had technology that enabled the weapon to evade Iran’s radar defense systems.

Two Iranian officials also tell the newspaper that Iran did not detect intrusions into its airspace yesterday, including drones, missiles or aircraft.

The outlet says that the warplane from which the missile was launched was “far from Israeli or Iranian airspace” and neither the jet nor the missile entered Jordanian airspace, in a calculated move to keep Amman out of any potential ramifications for the reprisal strike after it helped shoot down drones and missiles fired at Israel last weekend.

The alleged Israeli strike in Iran overnight Thursday-Friday went beyond the scope of several small drones described by Tehran, US media reported Friday.

The strike reportedly included at least one missile launched by Israeli Air Force warplanes that targeted an air defense radar site near Isfahan that was part of an array defending the nearby top-secret Natanz nuclear site.

Satellite imagery shows damage to the radar of an S-300 system at the Eighth Shekari Air Base in Isfahan, The New York Times says.

The report says the attack was deliberately designed to send a message of how a wider attack could look.

“Israel’s use of drones launched from inside Iran and a missile that it could not detect, the Western officials said, was intended to give Iran a taste of what a larger-scale attack might look like,” The New York Times writes. “The attack, they said, was calibrated to make Iran think twice before launching a direct attack on Israel in the future.”