Kheibar Shekan strike at terrorist targets in Syria carries message for Zionists

At the stroke of midnight on Monday, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) carried out ballistic missile strikes on Zionist targets in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region and Takfiri targets near Idlib in northwestern Syria, in response to their terrorism and subversive activities against Iran.

According to Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the IRGC’s Aerospace Force, the spy base near Erbil was targeted by four missiles from western Kermanshah province and seven missiles from northwestern West Azerbaijan province, 200 to 300 km away respectively.

He said four Kheibar Shekan missiles were also fired from the southern Khuzestan province at the Takfiri terrorist targets in Syria’s Idlib, adding that everything went smoothly in the operation.

Kheibar Shekan is a solid-fuel medium-range ballistic missile operated by the IRGC’s Aerospace Force, unveiled in 2022 on the occasion of the 43rd anniversary of the Islamic Revolution.

It is of the third generation of IRGC missiles, carries a 500 kg warhead and in the landing phase has maneuverability to bypass missile shields, with the ability to hit targets with pinpoint accuracy at a range and a radius of 1,450 kilometers.

One detail that caught the attention of military analysts around the world is the fact that the distance from Khuzestan province to the targeted Syrian position is 1,230 kilometers, which is why many pundits remarked that “Israel was put in range.”

Putting a Zionist entity in range is not new, as Iran has had this capability since 1998, when the Shahab-3 was first tested, and put into full operation five years later.

However, this model today is not adapted to the needs of modern warfare because it is large, inconvenient to transport and takes a long time to fill with liquid fuel, which makes it easy to discover and target in wartime conditions.

Its circular error probability (CEP) was estimated to be from 1000 to 4000m for first models, or from 200 to 800m for later models, making it suitable for targeting large enemy bases, more than precise strikes.