TEL AVIV, Israel — U.S. and Israeli officers
broke ground in Israel on Monday for a permanent
U.S. Army base that will house
dozens of U.S. soldiers, operating under the American flag,
and charged with
the mission of defending against rocket and missile attack.
The American base, officers in Israel say, will be an independent facility
co-located at the Israel Defense Forces
Air Defense
School in southern Israel,
near the desert capital of Beersheba. Once
completed, the base will house
U.S.
operational systems to identify and intercept a spectrum of aerial threats,
along with barracks, recreational and other facilities required to support
several dozen
American air defenders.
“A few dozens of soldiers of our American allies will
be stationed here permanently.
They are part of an American task force that
will be stationed here,” said Israeli Air Force Brig.
Gen. Zvika Haimovich, the
IDF‘s air defense commander.
According to Haimovich, the co-located, permanent U.S. presence will enhance
Israel’s
ability to detect and defend against the growing rocket and missile threat.
“The
purpose of their presence is not for training or for exercises,
but rather as
part of a joint Israeli and American effort to sustain
and enhance our
defensive capabilities.”
Maj. Gen. John Gronski, deputy commanding general of
the Army National Guard
in U.S. Army Europe, led the U.S. delegation
participating in Sept. 18 ceremonies.
Referring to the site as Site 883 Life Support Area,
Gronski said the planned base
“signifies the strong bond” that exists between
the United States and Israel.
“This life support area represents the first ever
stationing of a U.S.
Army unit on Israeli soil,” he said. “The U.S. and Israel have long planned together,
exercised together, trained together. And now, with the opening of this site,
these
crucial interactions will occur every day. We’ll have Israeli airmen,
US soldiers
living and working side by side.”
While the new U.S.
base marks the first to be co-located within an Israeli base and the first in
which active interceptors are to be deployed, the U.S.
military has operated an independent facility
for nearly a decade in the same
general area of Israel’s Negev desert.
That facility — which is operated only
by Americans without an Israeli presence — houses
the U.S. AN/TPY-2, an
X-Band radar that is integrated with Israeli search and track radars
to augment
early warning in the event of ballistic missile attack from Iran.
In his briefing to reporters, Haimovich said the IDF
has been working with its
U.S.
counterparts for nearly two years to establish the new facility.
He emphasized
that the American presence “would not hamper the IDFs ability
to act
independently against any threat to the security of the State of Israel.”
He also noted that in recent weeks, the IDFs Air
Defense Command stood up a new
Iron Dome battalion to enable the Jewish state
to more equitably deploy active defenses
along its northern as well as southern
borders, where Israel faces
growing threats from Lebanon
and Gaza,
respectively.
One of Israel’s
operational Iron Dome systems is now in the U.S., where it is competing
with
U.S.-proposed systems for an interim — and possibly longer-term
— solution
to the medium- and short-range air defense requirement.
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