With the costs of over 10's of thousands of dollars each, it would not be possible to use this defense agains kassams which cost $100. Hamas will know how to bleed us dry and they will win in the end. Insead these defense shields have been created to defend against larger and more dangerous missels which would come from Iran and syria. The only real defense is a great offense. No missle defense will ever create a secure country...

that the government wouldnt deploy millions of dollars worth of missiles to protect the South - but they would to protect Tel Aviv. I think that's wrong and I can't blame this woman for feeling so upset, angry an let down by her government.

state people safe, mmm better trust god on that one, cause if it up to people like Avi from TA than you r doomed.

Wasn't set up to be deployed this soon after the test. While I understand her fear and ask the same question. If this had hit Tel Aviv what would be the the response? Now we see the Arabs aren't firing bottle rockets, as the anti-Israel excuse makers like to write. In their antisemitic vision, just because more Arabs die from the IDF response, that isn't fair, why is that? Israel doesn't have to apologize for having better weapons, do they? I think Hamas is trying to up the ante...so to speak...to provoke Israel. First to get into the news again, Second, they trying to take advantage of the political unrest in the Arab countries. They know it hard for Israel to respond from a PR standpoint. Mainly because of the false accusation of "disproportional response". So now Hamas can test some missile ranges, without worrying about a rightful overwhelming response from Israel. It's a kind of win/win for the Arabs. If Israel does respond harshly...as they should...it will be used by the radical elements in the rioting countries to try and catapult them into power. If Israel doesn't respond they get to run there test firing for the upcoming war in Gaza.

"I shot an arrow into the air, it fell to earth I knew not where." - HWL

One might note that the Phalanx system is used to protect ships of the U.S. navy against close range missile attacks. The U.S. Army uses it to protect forward bases. The 20 mm ammunitition, fired at the rate of 2,000 rounds per minute, is much cheaper than the missiles of the Iron Dome and the Arrow. It might prove quite successful for communities close to Gaza. Leaving the Arrow for longer range missiles.

Totally agree with you Talula. Our people in the south have suffered enough. Time for the government to act real fast.

Now you sadly know how we residents of Haifa felt during the summer Lebanon war. We were subjected to daily katusha attacks,yet how many of them were destroyed before they hit us not many if at all considering our sirens were blaring all day every day for the entire war! Life went on as usual in the rest of the country, and until Tel Aviv is threatened the government will do nothing, because the rest of us don't matter to them as much as the Tel Aviv residents!

Each Phalanx system is 5.6million dollars (1998 dollars). RoF is 4500 rounds/minute. Range is about a mile. Using these requires 1 every 2 kilometers. Add the personnel costs and maintenance costs. This is not a cheap solution.

the goverment will do nothing !!!Only if something will happen with BIBI.The same with Gilat ,if BIBI his son was in gaza he was back in israel afther one day.Open you eyes!!!!!

The Arrow is, of course, intended to protect against strategic threats from the likes of Iran. Other systems - Iron Dome in particular - are intended to protect against shorter-range rockets. But even those systems have yet to be deployed. Currently, they're in storage and will likely end up protecting IDF bases, not the periphery. And one has to ask why. Dbanai asks why Israel didn't go with the Phalanx for short range defense. The simple answer is that it's a US system, while an Israeli system like ID can be sold overseas. (Singapore for one is interested in it.) One sees a similar motivation in the US, which rejected the Israeli "Trophy" system for US forces, electing instead to hold out for a similar system expected a few years out from Raytheon. The reason I suspect Iron Dome hasn't been fielded is a fear, not just that it will be proven less effective than claimed, but that it will invite forces in Gaza to "test" its effectiveness and thus spark *more* rocket and mortar assaults. Thus they think it's better to keep them in storage and pretend they'll provid the needed defense when things flare up.

Arrow is not designed to deal with things like medium range Grad rockets. The Davids sling system under development is for that kind of thing. Arrow is designed to destroy ballistic missiles like the Iranian Shihab. The Phlanx is not designed for protecting urban areas its for military bases and ships. Even Phlanx is no good for rockets like Grad it would be for short range rockets like the Kassams which Iron Dome is supposed to shoot down. Instead of developing Iron Dome which was developed for political reasons.. allow Olmert to boast that in future Hizbollah would not be able to shoot rockets because something will be developed and it will be made in Israel to boost the feel good factor. Olmert gave Israeli defense companies around $300 million and said invent something anything and we got Iron Dome which cost around $50,000 per kill. That money should have been invested in the laser weapon that Israel and the US had been jointly developing before then until funds ran out. The prototype is currently on a test range in a US somewhere and it did succesfully shoot down kassams in tests so we know it works even in its current form. It also only cost around $1000 per kill. Still expensive but compared to Iron Dome thats dirt cheap. We ended up with the political system rather than the most practical one.