First Iron Dome Tamir interceptor built entirely in the US rolls out in Arkansas

A Tamir interceptor for Israel's Iron Dome air defense system has, for the first time, been manufactured and assembled in full in the United States. The Times of Israel reported that Israel's Defense Ministry announced the completion, which took place at a plant in Camden, Arkansas, run jointly by the American defense company Raytheon and Israel's Rafael Advanced Defense Systems.

The missile was handed over at a ceremony at the facility on October 8, 2026, where the ministry's Homa missile defense directorate formally received it. Joe Truzman of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies wrote that the East Camden plant is the first location outside Israel to turn out complete Tamir interceptors, and that the move adds production capacity within the joint US and Israeli missile defense program.

Who builds the interceptor

The Arkansas facility is operated by R2S, short for Raytheon-Rafael Protection Systems, according to the Hebrew-language Telegram channel Abu Ali Express. R2S is a joint venture between Raytheon, which is part of the American group RTX, and Rafael, the Israeli state-owned defense firm that developed Iron Dome. The Times of Israel noted that the United States had already been supplying components for Tamir missiles before this point; what is new is that every stage of manufacture and final assembly was carried out on American soil.

Reports differ slightly on how they name the site. The Times of Israel refers to both Camden and East Camden in Arkansas, while Abu Ali Express and Joe Truzman give East Camden. Israel Hayom describes the location as the R2S manufacturing facility in Camden.

What Homa and Mafat are

Homa, the Hebrew word for "wall", is the name of the Israeli Defense Ministry body responsible for missile defense programs. In English it is known as the Israel Missile Defense Organization, or IMDO. Israel Hayom identified the IMDO as part of the ministry's Directorate of Defense Research, known in Hebrew by the acronym Mafat. Mafat oversees research and development of weapons systems for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The Times of Israel named Moshe Patel as head of the Homa directorate; he appears in the official photograph from the ceremony.

Who attended the ceremony

According to the Times of Israel, which published a Defense Ministry photograph of the event, those present included:

• Maj. Gen. Tal Politis, the IDF military attach\u00e9 in Washington
• Shlomo Toaff, a Rafael senior vice president who heads its Air Defense Division
• Moshe Patel, head of the Homa directorate
• Tom Cotton, US senator for Arkansas, and Sarah Huckabee Sanders, governor of Arkansas
• Tom Liberty, head of Air and Land Systems at Raytheon
• Jonathan Casey, chief executive of R2S
• Bruce Westerman, a congressman from Arkansas
• Maj. Gen. Jason Cothern, deputy director of the US Missile Defense Agency
• Adi Farjoon, Israel's Consul General to the Southwest United States

The presence of state and federal officials alongside Israeli defense representatives reflects that the program is run jointly between the two governments, a point Truzman also made in describing it as a combined US and Israeli effort.

Why production outside Israel matters

Iron Dome is the layer of Israel's air defense designed to intercept short-range rockets and similar threats, and the Tamir is the missile it fires. Because each interception uses up an interceptor, the rate at which new missiles can be made is a practical limit on how long the system can keep operating at high tempo. Until now, according to Truzman, complete Tamir interceptors had only been produced in Israel. A second full production line in the United States gives the program another source of supply. Israel Hayom characterised the step as a significant milestone in defense cooperation between the two countries.

What the reports do not say

None of the reports gives a figure for how many Tamir interceptors the Arkansas plant is expected to produce, over what period, or at what cost. They do not say how output will be divided between Israel and the United States, or whether the US-made missiles will be stockpiled in America or shipped to Israel. Israel Hayom's headline describes the interceptor as delivered to Israel, while the other reports describe the Homa directorate receiving it at a ceremony at the plant itself; none states whether the missile has physically left Arkansas. The reports also do not explain how long the production line took to set up, or when the plant began building complete interceptors rather than components.