Tehran / Tel Aviv / Washington — Military planners are reeling after Iran claimed its newest strike package “punctured” US and Israeli defence shields, using swarms of so‑called “unstoppable” missiles and drones to slip through Patriot, THAAD, Iron Dome and Arrow in a single, coordinated onslaught.

According to Iranian commanders, the attack combined cheap decoy drones, low‑flying cruise missiles and a handful of advanced, maneuvering ballistic warheads. Radar operators in Israel and on US Gulf bases watched their screens flood with targets as interceptors roared skyward, but several projectiles still slammed near runways, fuel depots and logistics hubs, triggering fires and forcing temporary shutdowns.

Defence analysts say the real shock isn’t the damage, but how the system was stressed. Many of the new Iranian drones flew terrain‑hugging routes, using pre‑programmed waypoints and AI‑aided navigation to dodge known radar fields. Others carried electronic‑warfare pods, blinding sensors just long enough for heavier missiles to race through. “Every $10,000 drone was burning a million‑dollar interceptor,” one expert noted.

In Tel Aviv and Washington, urgent reviews are underway to understand the vulnerabilities exposed in a matter of minutes. Officials insist the majority of threats were still intercepted, but privately admit that Iran’s evolving playbook — mass, mix and overwhelm — is eroding the aura of invincibility around Western missile defence.

The message from Tehran is blunt: in the next phase of this shadow war, the most dangerous weapons may not be the biggest or the fastest, but the ones that are simply too many, too smart and too cheap to stop all at once.