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Have Iran's ballistic missile capabilities been damaged by Israeli attacks?

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Have Iran's ballistic missile capabilities been damaged by Israeli attacks?

The Israeli Air Force struck a dozen targets in Iran used to produce solid fuel for long-range ballistic missiles as part of its military retaliation against the Islamic Republic, significantly affecting Tehran's ability to replenish its stocks, it was reported on Saturday evening.

The targets attacked were sophisticated equipment that Iran could not produce itself and had to be purchased from China. Walla reported. The targets were a crucial part of Iran's ballistic missile program. Walla quoted three anonymous Israeli sources.

An American researcher said an Israeli airstrike on Saturday hit a building that was part of Iran's defunct nuclear weapons development program, and he and another researcher said facilities used to mix solid fuel for missiles were also hit.

The assessments, based on commercial satellite images, were made separately by David Albright, a former U.N. weapons inspector, and Decker Eveleth, an associate research analyst at CNA, a Washington think tank.

They told Reuters that Israel had attacked buildings in Parchin, a huge military complex near Tehran. Israel also attacked Khojir, a sprawling missile production site near Tehran, according to Eveleth.

A screenshot from a handout video published on October 26, 2024 shows an Israeli Air Force aircraft departing to attack Iran, according to the Israeli army (Source: IDF).

The Iranian military said Israeli warplanes used “very light warheads” to attack border radar systems in Ilam, Khuzestan provinces and around Tehran.

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According to the U.N. nuclear regulator, the International Atomic Energy Agency and U.S. intelligence, Iran abandoned the program in 2003. Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons.

Albright, head of the Institute for Science and International Security research group, gained access to the program files for a book after they were stolen from Tehran by the Israeli secret service Mossad in 2018.

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Iran may have removed key materials before the airstrike, he said, but “even if no equipment remained inside,” the building would have provided “intrinsic value” for future nuclear weapons-related activities.

Albright told Reuters that commercial satellite images from Parchin showed Israel damaged three buildings about 320 meters from Taleghan 2, including two where solid ballistic missile fuel was mixed.

He did not name the trading company from which he purchased the images.

Eveleth said an image taken by Parchin from Planet Labs, a commercial satellite company, showed Israel destroyed three ballistic missile and solid fuel mixing buildings and a warehouse in the sprawling complex.

Images from Planet Labs also showed that an Israeli strike destroyed two buildings in the Khojir complex where solid propellant for ballistic missiles was mixed, he said.

According to the image reviewed by Reuters, the buildings were surrounded by high earthworks. Such structures are related to rocket production and are intended to prevent an explosion in one building from detonating flammable materials in nearby buildings.

“Israel says they targeted buildings housing solid-state mixers,” Eveleth said. “These industrial mixers are difficult to manufacture and are subject to export controls. Iran has imported many of these at great expense over the years and will likely have a hard time replacing them.”

With a limited operation, he said, Israel might have dealt a significant blow to Iran's ability to mass-produce missiles and made it harder for a future Iranian missile attack to break through Israel's missile defenses.

“The attacks appear to be very precise,” he said.

Axios reported that Israel destroyed twelve “planetary mixers” used to produce solid fuel for long-range ballistic missiles, citing three unnamed Israeli sources as saying that this significantly affects Iran's ability to renew its missile stockpile and threatens Iran Israel could deter further massive rocket attacks.

Israeli sources also said that four S-300 air defense batteries located at strategic locations protecting nuclear and energy facilities in Tehran during the operation were attacked. A drone manufacturing factory and a facility at the Parchin military complex, where research and development activities for nuclear weapons have taken place in the past, were also attacked.

Additional reports of attacks

The Arabic independent online newspaper Elaph Israel reportedly targeted a secret ballistic missile factory in Iran, destroying a large number of heavy fuel mixers used to power Kheibar and Haj Qasem missiles – both of which were fired by Iran at Israel earlier this month. The report also claimed that the S-300 air defense batteries attacked were Russian-made and destroyed radars that power these and other systems in Syria and Iraq.

According to the report, the ballistic missile factory was completely destroyed. A source told Elaph that it was the “backbone of Iran's missile industry” and that Israel had “decommissioned” it, and also reported that each heavy oil mixer destroyed was estimated to cost at least two million dollars and about twenty mixers of this type were destroyed.

While Walla Informed sources about the Iranian missile industry reported that production to restore this equipment would reportedly take at least a year Elaph that it would take at least two years to put the destroyed factory back into operation.

Iranian and Israeli officials confirmed this New York Times that Israel had targeted the defenses of the Bandar Imam Khomeini petrochemical complex in Khuzestan province; at the adjacent large commercial port of Bandar Imam Khomeini; and at the Abadan oil refinery.

“Israel is sending a clear message to us,” said Hamid Hosseini, an expert on Iran’s oil and gas industry and a member of the Iran-Iraq Chamber of Commerce Just. “This can have very serious economic consequences for Iran, and now that we understand what is at stake, we must act wisely and not continue tensions.”

sources told The Jerusalem Post that the estimated prognosis was six months to a year.

In total, more than 100 Israeli aircraft took part in the attack on Iranian targets, stating that their mission was to hit the Islamic Republic's most advanced air defense systems and establish air superiority there for possible upcoming IAF operations – in such a way that Israeli fighter jets will in future be able to fly at relatively low altitudes in the sky over Tehran itself.

Estimates suggest it will take many more days to assess the damage caused by the attacks.



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