Israeli authorities are investigating a missile strike in central Tel Aviv that may have involved a weapon breaking into several parts before impact.
The Israeli government’s press office described the incident as a direct hit from a ballistic missile.
A police commander in the Tel Aviv area also told a local Israeli television station that the impact involved what he described as a “splitting missile.”
The description has raised the possibility that the weapon may have been a type of cluster munition. These weapons contain smaller explosive “bomblets” that separate from the main missile and spread across a wider area after the initial explosion.
Israel has previously accused Iran of using similar munitions earlier in the conflict and during the 12-Day War last June.
Cluster munitions are banned by more than 100 countries under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, although Iran, Israel and the United States are not signatories to the treaty.
At the scene of the explosion in Tel Aviv, a CNN reporter said investigators are examining debris believed to be part of the missile.
“Debris still falls in central Tel Aviv even after interceptions. One key piece behind me here that investigators are poring over, one official here telling us that it seems to perhaps be one of the warheads we’ve noticed that appear to split in the sky and send off separate fragments down. Now nobody as far as we understand injured in this location but it’s a sign that despite the fact we’ve seen probably less missiles overall fired by Iran over the past days, it only takes one even with the sophisticated air defences here to cause some havoc in a scene like this.”
The reporter, in to a CNN video, added that the strike has drawn attention from investigators trying to determine whether the weapon signals a change in Iran’s missile capabilities.
“But across the region the focus perhaps now turning as it’s clear Iran’s missile capacities have come down on their ability to wreak havoc closer to Iranian shores with drones that are hitting around the but the scene behind me here is still one of intense scrutiny as I think they try and work out if this marks some kind of new development in Iranian missile technology.”
