On March 9, 2026, during one of the barrages Hezbollah launched at Israel, the terrorist organization struck the Ha'Ela satellite station in the Valley of Elah, not far from Beit Shemesh. At the time, the incident may not have appeared especially dramatic. A closer look, however, reveals a very different picture.
For those planning the attack in Beirut and Tehran, the target was a deliberate choice intended to achieve one goal: disrupting a strategic communications artery that helps enable Israel to operate and deploy forces around the globe.
Israeli teams quickly began working to repair the site and restore it to full operational capability. Together with other facilities, it serves as a platform linking ground infrastructure in Israel with space, a connection that has grown increasingly important in recent years.
"Satellite communications are operated from several secret bases across the country," a senior IDF official told Israel Hayom. "Together with the deployment of our strategic satellites, this gives us the ability to operate with digital freedom in Iran."
The world is already taking notice
Israel is hardly alone in recognizing that space is no longer the backdrop of science fiction but a genuine operational front.
Speaking recently at the Air & Space Forces Association's annual Air, Space & Cyber Conference, US Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink publicly acknowledged that Washington has weapons deployed in orbit, including capabilities whose details remain classified.
"The United States now has on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the Joint Force against hostile adversary action," Meink said.
US officials have also made clear that publicly discussing such capabilities has a deterrent purpose. Just as US President Donald Trump established the US Space Force during his first term, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir is now advancing Israel's own major organizational move in the space domain.
As first revealed by Israel Hayom, Zamir has decided to establish a strategic Space Brigade within the IDF General Staff, identifying space as one of the central building blocks of the military's multiyear "Hosen" plan.
"Space is no longer the future," the senior IDF official said. "It is an actual theater of war. Just as the IDF invested in maritime and aerial weapons systems, today it is also investing in space."
Operations already taking shape
Central to that effort is the Sphera Brigade, the IDF General Staff's operational-technological spectrum and communications division. Established over the past year within the IDF's Computer Service and Cyber Defense Directorate, it is intended to lead military activity in precisely this field.
The brigade leads the campaign for superiority across the electromagnetic spectrum, the invisible range of frequencies used to transmit information and communications, and safeguards the IDF's strategic communications capabilities. Those capabilities range from a classified mobile device at the Kirya IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv to the communications network used by a pilot flying over Iran, who needs to speak with strike cells on the ground.
"The ability of aircraft to operate hundreds and thousands of kilometers from Israel's borders also rests on the satellite communications network operated by the brigade," the senior official said.
"The pilots who carried out strikes in Iran did so using advanced communications capabilities, including satellite communications. The goal is to allow operations far from Israeli territory with the same digital capabilities you have when fighting on one of Israel's borders, essentially making a distant, third-circle theater operate like a first-circle front.
"Even at distances of more than 1,500 kilometers (about 930 miles) we operated using this kind of communications. Whoever controls communications and intelligence in space, a central theater of modern warfare, enables the military to project force over long distances."
The change after Oct. 7
To establish control over this enormous battlespace, where global powers are engaged in an intense military and civilian race to learn, develop and deploy new capabilities, the IDF must expand its investments and resources if it hopes to keep pace.
"Since Oct. 7, the number of satellites the IDF uses has doubled," the senior official revealed, while military officials acknowledge that the actual increase is even greater.
"In recent years, space has become a central operational-technological infrastructure for warfare. As a result, over the past five years the IDF has tripled the resources it invests in the space domain, and it is constantly developing new capabilities in response to the enemy's advances."
The directorate also works with major communications and technology companies in the field, sometimes learning from them about emerging capabilities and new developments.
"Since the Black Saturday attacks of Oct. 7, 2023, we have understood that we need to be able to produce things ourselves and rely on our own capabilities," IDF officials said. Cooperation with major industry players, they add, is helping military professionals move closer to that goal.
Enemy operations thwarted
The senior IDF official said that many of the military's achievements during the past three years were made possible by communications links established far above the Earth.
"Spectrum warfare allows us to disrupt enemy attempts to close a fire-control loop and strike maneuvering forces," he said. "On many occasions we activated these capabilities from deep inside enemy territory and prevented Hamas, Hezbollah and Iranian proxies from activating weapon systems."
"Many soldiers' lives were saved during the war thanks to electronic-warfare capabilities in this front. We can assess that there were hundreds of separate operational incidents in Gaza, Lebanon and other theaters in which these capabilities prevented attacks on our forces."
"This is a genuine strategic asset for the State of Israel," he added. "It allows the IDF to operate freely in any theater where it may be required to act."
Creating such a comprehensive envelope is not solely a military undertaking. To maintain an advantage in a domain dominated by major powers, the brigade works closely with Israel's other security organizations and defense industries. It also cooperates with the US, a major IDF partner in wartime and, increasingly, in technological fields as well. All involved understand that Israel's enemies are monitoring its activity in these areas and are trying to disrupt it.
"During the war, we dealt with quite a few defensive and offensive incidents in the spectrum," the senior official said. "Here, too, this is a significant operational front, and what takes place there can fire the imagination. You cannot understand the fighting against Iran without understanding what happened in the spectrum and in communications," he said, describing battles that remain largely invisible to the public.
Influence operations are part of the picture
Just as the brigade can use control of the electromagnetic environment defensively, it can also exploit that domain to target particular devices and systems in pursuit of various operational objectives.
It can reasonably be assumed, for example, that some Israeli influence operations in Lebanon, Iran and the Gaza Strip are conducted at least in part with the involvement of the brigade's experts. Their capabilities could potentially include activating radio systems in Lebanon to broadcast warnings about Iranian entrenchment in the country or even taking control of communications networks used by vessels participating in flotillas bound for the Gaza Strip.
On such operations, naturally, no unequivocal answers are forthcoming. Despite its focus on warfighting, the brigade's soldiers and officers must also deal with routine challenges on a daily basis. Among other things, they manage the constant, more ordinary friction along Israel's borders and coordinate with other security and civilian bodies to prevent frequency conflicts and mutual interference.
"It is remarkable that in 1965 the Syrians caught Eli Cohen using spectrum-related means, and since then the use of the spectrum has expanded dramatically," the senior official said.
"Today, the spectrum is a major asset on both distant and nearby battlefields. Israel is in a very good position compared with the rest of the world, but there is always room for us to improve. People need to understand that almost every system today is connected to this domain, from the phone and smartwatch in your home to the most advanced weapons systems. This is an enormous theater of warfare, most of which is hidden from view, but its effect on the battlefield is dramatic. In practice, it is what makes today's battlefield technological above all else. Whoever controls the spectrum, communications and digital domain gains a significant operational advantage, sometimes even before the first shot is fired."
For all the technology, however, he stressed that people remain the decisive factor.
"We have the very best people, and they are everywhere," he said. "They are the reason our excellent systems work at every destination across the globe. They are technological combat soldiers, engineers and professionals operating at every level of warfare. Our goal now is to continue using our people to stay ahead of changes in the threat and the pace of technological development: to fully exploit advanced space capabilities, integrate artificial intelligence tools that provide adaptive responses to threats and support rapid decision-making, strengthen resilience and operational continuity, and continue ensuring the IDF's freedom of action on a battlefield where the electromagnetic environment faces an evolving threat."
