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(September 8, 2020 / JNS) The United States’ Raytheon Missiles & Defense company and Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defense Systems made an unusual announcement in August, stating that they had signed a joint venture to produce Iron Dome weapons systems on American soil. The new partnership anticipates finalizing a site location, either in Arkansas or Alabama, before the end of the year. “This will be the first Iron Dome all-up-round facility outside of Israel, and it will help the U.S. Department of Defense and allies across the globe obtain the system for defense of their service members and critical infrastructure,” said...

Lockheed Martin and RAFAEL have signed a cooperation agreement to jointly develop, manufacture, market and support RAFAEL’s Smart, Precise Impact and Cost-Effective (SPICE) missile guidance kits to Lockheed Martin’s platforms. RAFAEL already subcontracts about 80 percent of SPICE subassemblies to US manufacturers in eight states. The agreement will enable Israel to buy SPICE kits from the USA, using US military support funds. The agreement follows a market assessment evaluation done by the two partners in the past year. “Access to GPS is becoming increasingly limited in contested environments,” said Mr. Yuval Miller, executive vice president, and general manager of Rafael’s...

Firing the Israeli Spike NLOS missile from a Colombian Arpia-4 helicopter, a variant of the UH-60 Black Hawk. Three weeks ago, US Army experts traveled to the Negev Desert to watch a test of the latest, longest-range version of Rafael’s Spike missile. Fired from an Israeli AH-64 Apache, the same gunship used by US attack helicopter squadrons, the Spike NLOS struck a target 20 miles away — four times the range of the standard US Hellfire. “The missile hit the target with maximum precision,” Moshe Elazar, head of Rafael land systems, proudly told Breaking Defense. While the US Army hasn’t...

At Farnborough 2018, the Spice 250 is being displayed as an option for both the Eurofighter Typhoon and Saab Gripen. Rafael’s Spice 250 electro-optical/infrared-guided glide bomb is on course to achieve initial operational capability with the Israel Air and Space Force next year, following a third test campaign earlier this year that saw the 100-km (62-mile) range weapon successfully engage moving, maritime, and time-critical targets. A few more qualification tests are due to be undertaken, with low-rate production just getting under way. At Farnborough 2018, the weapon is being displayed as an option for both the Eurofighter Typhoon and Saab...

The South African Air Force has been offered enhanced capabilities for its Gripen fighter aircraft with a suit of new advanced systems developed by Israeli company Rafael. The Israeli company's offers a concept that it claims can bring fighter aircraft to a an advanced 4.5 generation standard by upgrading the different systems. The concept is being evaluated by the Indian Air Force for its Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) fighter aircraft. The upgrade suit that according to Rafael can enhance the fighter aircraft's capabilities to a 4.5 generation standard includes the Rafael BNET which is an advanced IP Mobile Ad-hoc Network...

The military has announced a new capacity to protect Israel’s natural-gas drilling platforms following a successful test Monday of the Iron Dome anti-rocket system installed on a missile ship. The Israel Defense Forces tested Iron Dome’s ability to protect the country’s drilling platforms in the Mediterranean Sea. The system, constructed on the missile ship’s helicopter pad, operates in tandem with the identification systems of the navy and air force. The testing began more than a year ago as a joint project of the navy, air force and defense contractors. During the test, an Iron Dome battery was installed on the...

Israeli firm Rafael took the opportunity afforded by the Pacific International Maritime Exposition in Sydney to internationally launch its latest variant of the Typhoon remote-controlled naval gun, the Mk 30c. The ‘c’ represents compact, an indication that size is an important feature of this gun that weighs around 1t. Meanwhile, the ‘30’ refers to the ATK Mk44 Bushmaster II 30mm cannon that the system hosts. However, an important evolution on the Typhoon Mk-30c is the ability to change the gun barrel to 20mm, 25mm or 30mm. The interchangeable barrel, which also encompasses changes to the fire control system to update...

Spike LR II system. (photo credit:RAFAEL ADVANCED DEFENSE SYSTEMS) Rafael Advanced Defense Systems has unveiled its fifth-generation Spike multipurpose missile with a significant increase in range and lethality. According to a statement released Monday by the company, the Spike LR II “is an advanced multipurpose missile, weighing only 12.7 kg., and can be launched from any Spike launcher.” It has a range of 5.5 km. when fired from ground launchers and up to 10 km. when fired from a helicopter. The Spike LR II, which can be fired from vehicles, helicopters, ships and ground launchers, has advanced electro-optic seekers which...

by: Jim Buzzell My number one political goal this year is to get Donald J Trump elected President of the United States of America. Once that is done my next number one goal is to take care of this illegal alien posing as a US citizen: Why has no one in the national media, national conservative talk show hosts or anyone else investigated, probed or asked questions about Rafael Edward (Ted) Cruz’s birth right? 1 RAFAEL EDWARD (TED) CRUZ: Was born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in 1970. 2 Is Rafael Cruz a Natural Born Citizen of the United States of...

What Did Trump Really Say About Cruz' Wife and Father?

CNN had two different people on who said Ted Cruz will not be endorsing Cruz in his speech. The one reporter said that Ted Cruz anticipates running for President in 2020 if Trump loses and wants to show his sympathies with the Never Trump movement who has supported him. This is just as I feared when Ted was asked to speak. Trump was kind enough to ask him, but I worried that Ted would use this speech to pad his own resume, to preach to his base, to audition for 2020. Ted should not be permitted to use this speech...

By 1990, the oil-services company Rafael Cruz had founded with his wife had collapsed. Their properties had been foreclosed on; they declared bankruptcy. “We assumed the downturn was temporary and struggled through the lean times, hoping for a change that never came,” he wrote in a memoir, “A Time for Action,” released in January of this year. “We lost everything, including our home.” Mr. Cruz’s inspirational tale of fleeing Cuba and making it in America through faith and hard work has stirred crowds across the country as he campaigns on behalf of his son, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. But...

In these speeches, Cruz sometimes admits — with disbelief — that he once supported Fidel Castro’s revolution. “I started speaking at different rotary clubs around Austin, Texas — in favor of Castro! I still thought he was the savior of the country,” he told FreedomWorks, a conservative group, in 2013. Local news articles and documents from the late 1950s offer a clearer picture of the days of Cruz as a young man, then a believer in the revolution and a visible college activist. On Jan. 8, 1959, Fidel Castro rode victoriously into Havana. The country’s dictator, Batista, had fled a...

Conservative Republicans support for Sen. Ted Cruz indicates that the conservative movement is brain dead. If Cruz is the best candidate they can find, then conservatives obviously have nothing to offer. Cruz may be the only Republican presidential aspirant who is dumber than Hillary Clinton.

Rafael Advanced Defense Systems will supply three Mini Typhoon remotely controlled weapon mounts to arm three multi-purpose attack crafts (MPAC MKIII) of the Philippine Navy. The contract amount is $12 million (PhP 594,319,550), each RWS will operate 12.7 heavy machine guns also mount Spike-ER launchers, extending the boat’s firepower to more than 8 kilometers. The new boats are constructed by a joint venture between Philippine shipbuilder Propmech Corporation and Taiwanese builder Lung Teh Shipbuilding Corporation. MPAC Mk III will also have provisions for two M60/7.62mm Light Machine Gun. According to Philippine sources each Mini-Typhoon will contain 2,000 rounds and 10...

Waiting so long for Rafael to respond to a new fashion in missile technology seemed surprising only because the state-owned Israeli weapons and sensor house is most often the industry’s leading trendsetter. But Rafael has been curiously slow to respond to a clear trend within the air-to-air missile community. In the past decade, the most anticipated new missiles – the Chinese PL-12, MBDA Meteor, Raytheon AIM-120D and Vympel RVV-AE-PD – have all shared a similar trait. As advanced sensors push the detection range of missile firing platforms ever farther, missile manufacturers have responded with new weapons with ranges beyond 54nm...

Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump says it would be a risky move to give Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) the party's nomination for president amid questions about his eligibility. "It's not a settled matter. He was born in Canada. And I say to Ted, and as a Republican I say it, because I think it's very important, you gotta get it straightened out," Trump told supporters at a rally in Clear Lake, Iowa, on Saturday. He said it would be risky to nominate Cruz "because you cannot put somebody there folks who's going to go in, and he's going to be...

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz did not back down from his stance on immigration Wednesday night, after being confronted by a woman who asked if he would deport her, even though it was her parents who brought her to the United States illegally. During an event in Storm Lake, Iowa, Wednesday night, Ofelia Valdez, 30, told Cruz that although she was brought to the country illegally by her parents as a teen, she was able to retain residency due to President Barack Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or "DREAM act." As a DACA holder myself, I am worried about...

Didn't expect attacks to come from them... not on the first day.  And not sure what's up with Ralph Z. Hallow's agenda -be it lib or GOP establishment-connected- but what a bunch of intellectually-dishonest hooey: Shortly after launching his 2016 presidential bid, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz went on Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News for a full hour Monday night where he told the story of how his Cuban-born father, Rafael Cruz, fought against the dictator in charge of Cuba at time, Fulgencio Bautista, more than a half century ago.  But Mr. Cruz, 44, didn’t once mention that his father...

RAFAEL unveils at Euronaval the C-DOME - close-in weapon system that provides a defensive shield for naval surface vessels, against multiple simultaneous ripple attacks. C-DOME suite comprises a 10-missile stack, packed in a vertical launch unit installed below deck. The system utilizes combat-proven Tamir interceptor missiles, and command and control, integrated with the ship’s surveillance and air defense radar. Photos: RAFAEL RAFAEL is extending the Iron Dome Counter-Rocket, Artillery and Mortar defense system to the maritime domain, to protect surface vessels from a wide range of threats, including ballistic trajectory and direct attack weapons. The navalized system dubbed ‘C-Dome’ is...