Israel's David's Sling air defense system operational debut failed due to incorrect activation compounded by technical malfunctions, the Air Defense Command's initial investigation has found.
The system was used for the first time last week, when two interceptors were launched as a precaution against ballistic missiles fired within neighboring Syria. Both missed their mark, triggering concerns that David's Sling, which was deployed in April, was declared operational too soon.
David's Sling, which counters medium- to long-range projectiles, is part of Israel's multi-tiered air defense system. It is designed to complement the Iron Dome defense system, which regularly destroys short-range rockets and artillery shells, the Arrow 2 short- and medium-range ballistic missile interceptor, and the Arrow 3 long-range missile interceptor.
The inquiry into last week's incident found that David's Sling operators had only seconds to decide whether or not to launch the interceptors and decided to do so.
Early reports suggested that the interceptor's trajectory had somehow changed in midair, causing them to hit Syrian soil a few hundred feet inside the border. The Air Defense Command's probe, however, concluded that one interceptor exploded mid-flight while the other landed on the Syrian side of the border.
The premise leading the investigation was that during the incident, David's Sling had experienced a technical failure. The team tasked by Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Amikam Norkin to review the incident found that while that was, to some extent, the case, the team operating the system had also failed to activate it correctly.
Much of the investigation remains classified, but a senior Israeli Air Force official told the Walla News website Sunday that "one we substantiated the initial findings we felt it was important to bring it to the public's attention. Various changes were made based on these findings to ensure similar incidents do not recur."
David's Sling, he stressed, "is a unique, first-of-its-kind system in many ways and it was designed to deal with specific, serious threats. The soldiers and officers manning this system are some of the most capable, professional personnel the IAF has."
The IDF Spokesman issued a statement saying, "On July 23, two Syrian SS-21 rockets were identified by Israeli air defenses as threatening to undermine Israeli sovereignty and its citizens. Following the identification, two David's Sling interceptors were launched at the rockets' direction.
"In recent days, a comprehensive operational investigation was conducted by the IAF, which concluded that the decision-making process – given the nature of the threat and taking into account the short window [of time] – was correct. The technical aspects of the incident are classified and cannot be released for security purposes.
"The lessons learned from the incident will be implemented by the Air Defense Command and the system's operators, who remain on a high level of operational readiness meant to protect the security of Israel and the public," the military's statement said.
Some in the defense establishment, however, lamented what they called "jumping to conclusions."
"This seems to be a case of human error with respect to making the decision to deploy David's Sling," one official told Channel 12.
"This doesn't look like technical issues. Jumping to this conclusion is unfortunate," he said.
