Israeli fighter jets over the Red Sea launched ballistic missiles to target Qatar last week, a US defense official has said, in what was a novel method likely designed to overcome the energy-rich country's air defences and avoid entering any Middle East nation's airspace.
The September 9 attack, which killed six people in Qatar's capital, Doha, upended months of diplomacy mediated by the Arabian Peninsula nation to reach a ceasefire in the Israel's genocide in Gaza that has left over 200,000 Palestinians dead or wounded, which experts say is an undercounted tally, and devastated the besieged enclave nearly two years.
Just over a week after the missile launch, Israel began a ground invasion targeting Gaza City. That has reignited anger in the region over the genocide, while the Doha attack has raised fears in other regional countries that they, too, could be struck.
The Israeli military took advantage of the element of surprise by firing in a direction probably not anticipated by Qatar or the United States, whose Mideast forward headquarters operates out of Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.
Even if those countries did know, experts say the Patriot missile batteries in Qatar likely would have been unable to intercept the missiles traveling through space at multiple times the speed of sound.
"We're probably talking about a few minutes from fire to impact, so not long at all," said Sidharth Kaushal, a missile expert and senior research fellow at the London-based Royal United Services Institute think tank.
"Even if (Patriot batteries) did pick it up, interception would have been dumb luck at that point."
Missiles fired from Red Sea
The US defence official told The Associated Press that the missiles were fired by Israeli fighter jets over the Red Sea, with Hamas peace negotiators gathered in Qatar to consider a Gaza truce proposal offered by US.
The official had direct knowledge about how Israel conducted the attack and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.
Another US defence official, who similarly spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Israeli attack was an "over the horizon" attack from outside Qatar's airspace.
The American military typically uses the term to describe air strikes conducted from great distances.
By launching ballistic missiles into space, Israel kept their missiles out of the airspace of surrounding Gulf countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, with which Israel long has wanted to reach a diplomatic recognition deal.
There is "the political factor, you're not flying over Saudi airspace and violating their sovereignty in the process, which is obviously useful if you do harbor the hope of ... normalising things with the Saudis," Kaushal said.
They also came west to east in a direction likely not being monitored by air defence systems in Qatar run by either the Americans or the Qataris.
Ballistic missiles fly up into the upper atmosphere or even space before coming back down at multiple times the speed of sound.
While a Patriot battery cannot hit at those heights, a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, can. Qatar ordered one during President Donald Trump's visit in May.
The United States has said it called Qatar as soon as it learned of the Israeli attack, but officials in Doha say the warning came only after the missiles hit.
Israeli media suggest the US knew of the impending attack and did not prevent Tel Aviv from targeting Doha.
An Israeli official, speaking only on condition of anonymity to discuss details of the attack, has said about 10 planes participated in the mission and launched about 10 missiles.
Israel has not acknowledged the weapons used or the precise details of the strike.
The Israeli military, the Qatari government and the Pentagon did not respond to requests for comment. The White House declined to comment, referring questions to the Israeli government.
The Wall Street Journal first reported on the means Israel used to attack Qatar.
Air-launched ballistic missiles fielded by China, Israel and Russia
The use of air-launched ballistic missiles has been common by Russia in its war on Ukraine as Moscow seeks to protect its aircrafts from Ukrainian air defences.
China showcased a nuclear-capable, air-launched ballistic missile this month during its Victory Day parade.
Israel has several variants of air-launched ballistic missiles, publicly known after the leak of US intelligence documents last year.
They include the Golden Horizon and the IS02 Rock, which the intelligence documents suggested Israel likely could use to attack Iran.
Israel launched a 12-day war against Iran in June that included the use of "standoff" weapons, which allow an aircraft to fire on a target from far outside a country's airspace.
The weapons used included air-launched ballistic missiles, experts have said, pointing to missile debris later found on the ground in Iraq.
