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Israel Defence Minister says Israel working on new missile system ‘capable of hitting anywhere in Middle East’

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Israeli Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman revealed on Monday that Israel is ‘working on’ a new missile system that will hit targets anywhere in the Middle East, AFP reported. In a statement, he said that state-owned arms manufacturer, Israel Military Industries (IMI), would deliver “within a few years” an advanced integrated system “allowing precise hits by remote launching”.

Considered to be the leading military power in the Middle East, Israel is also the only regional country to possess nuclear capability.

Lieberman said that the contract with IMI was budgeted at “hundreds of millions of shekels”, with the Israeli shekel currently trading at 3.63 to the dollar.

“The project for setting up a precision rocket and missile system is underway,” he stated. “Part of it is already in production and part is in the final phases of research and development. We are acquiring and developing precision fire systems that will allow… the Israel Defence Forces to cover within a few years every point in the region.”

Foreign military experts say it has several batteries of its Jericho ballistic missile, capable of delivering nuclear warheads.

IMI chairman Yitzhak Aharonovitch said that the new armament would “reflect the company’s technological capabilities, which specialise in the ability to fire accurately, to strike at a variety of ground targets”.

Currently, Israel has a number of foes, including Iran, Hamas, and the Iran-backed Shiite outfit Hezbollah in Lebanon. It also has a border alongside Syria, where Iran, Hezbollah and Bashar-Al Assad are currently embroiled in civil war.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that they will prevent Iran from establishing itself in Syria. Lieberman did not give out further details of the new system’s targets.

 

 

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