State Comptroller Joseph Shapira published a special report Nov. 14 on Israel's national preparedness against the drone threat. The comptroller cited the urgency of the threat in his decision to publish now rather than waiting to release the analysis as part of his annual report. Previous assessments, like that of the Hamas terror tunnels, he said, have sometimes lagged behind the rapid development of severe threats, and there is no time to waste.

The comptroller’s report touches on the threat of drones not only from a security perspective, but also from a criminal perspective. He emphasized that terror organizations have long known the advantages of drones, and they intend to expand their use significantly. That’s the reason that the comptroller repeatedly recalls the threat of the Hamas Gaza tunnels, which weren’t addressed appropriately by the security establishment before the Protective Edge operation of summer 2014.

The use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) is prevalent among Hezbollah, the Islamic State as well as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip. In February 2017, for example, the Israeli air force intercepted a UAV that flew from Gaza to the Mediterranean Sea, likely as a test by Hamas' military wing. Half a year earlier, an Israeli fighter jet fired a missile at a Hamas drone and shot it down. In another incident in June 2015, a Hamas drone crashed in an open field in Israel.

During Operation Protective Edge, the air force intercepted a drone that took off from Gaza and reached the beaches of Ashdod. A video later posted by Hamas' military wing claimed that another drone succeeded in bringing photos from the area of Israeli army headquarters in Tel Aviv.