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All you need to know about Israel-made Harop drones used by India in Pakistan
Over the last decade, India has imported military hardware worth $2.9 billion from Israel, including radars, surveillance and combat drones, and missiles.Dawn.com
May 8, 2025
The Pakistani military on Thursday said it took down nearly two dozen Indian drones sent on this side of the border since last night, as tensions between the neighbouring countries continue to rise.
According to the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), the armed forces shot down 25 Harop drones sent by India using their “soft-kill (technical) and hard-kill (weaponised) skills fully”.
In a press conference earlier today, DG ISPR Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said the drones were neutralised at various locations, including Karachi and Lahore. He also showed a series of pictures showing the debris of the drones.
He said that the process of India sending across these Harop drones was a “serious serious provocation”. “This naked aggression continues, and the armed forces are on a high degree of alert and neutralising them as we speak,” Gen Chaudhry asserted.
Harop drone is a loitering munition system developed by the MBT Missiles Division of Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI).
As per information available on the IAI website, loitering munitions are designed to hover over the battlefield and attack upon the operator’s commands.
The Harop is particularly known for its ability to hunt down enemy air defenses and other important targets. It combines the characteristics of a UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) and a missile, which is an airborne ranged weapon capable of self-propelled flight.
The drone can operate both fully autonomously or be manually operated in its human-in-the-loop mode. If a target is not engaged, the drone can return and land itself back at base. Harop, with its folding wings, can be launched from a truck- or ship-mounted canister, or configured for air-launch.
Speaking to Dawn.com, Dr Fahad Irfan Siddiqui, associate professor at Jamshoro’s Mehran University of Engineering and Technology, explained that Harop was a military grade technology drone. It was used for several purposes, including data collection and payload-installed attacks.
“Agri and civil survey drones have jammers installed in them, which get disconnected from their base station by blocking UHF frequencies. But for military grade drones, they are operated through satellites.
It is difficult to block their radio frequency. An extremely advanced military technology can be blocked satellite by satellite (it is debatable, though),” he said.
Dr Siddiqui highlighted that the drones we were hearing of in headlines seemed to be quadcopter-type, which were difficult to detect but were not lethal.
“According to international law, any drone weighing more than 250 grams requires a license from the respective country’s civil aviation authority. Drones weighing less are generally considered toy drones and are often used for recreational purposes such as photography; these typically do not require a license,” he elaborated.
“Drones over 250 grams are subject to stricter regulations. They are prohibited from flying within a five-kilometre radius of sensitive military installations, airports, and certain government buildings — these areas are designated as no-fly zones.
Moreover, the same five-kilometre buffer zone rule applies near international borders,” the professor added.
Under the International Humanitarian Law, targeting civilian sites, as India did in Pakistan, is a grave violation. The increasing use of loitering munitions and other advanced weapon systems in recent years has spurred international discussions on Lethal Autonomous Weapon Systems (LAWS). While a universally agreed-upon definition of LAWS remains elusive, they are generally understood as weapons that can select and attack targets without direct human intervention.
Loitering munitions, especially those with autonomous capabilities like the Harop, could potentially be classified as LAWS, raising significant questions about their compliance with IHL principles.
Over the last decade, India imported military hardware worth $2.9 billion from Israel, including radars, surveillance and combat drones, and missiles, TRT Global reported.
Earlier, in 2016 and 2020, the Harop was extensively used by Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict against Armenia, per information available on the Israeli military and security export database.
The attack drone supposedly hit a bus full of soldiers, killing half a dozen of them in the process, and destroying the bus.
In recent years, the drone has become an export success, with India and Azerbaijan purchasing the system.
The drones were also reportedly used in Syrian conflicts, credited with the destruction of a Syrian Air Defence SA-22 Greyhound in 2018 and in an attack on the Syrian Armed Forces in December 2024. There are also indications that Turkiye may have been an early adopter of the Harop, potentially using it as early as 2005.
Header image: Picture of the Harop Long Range Loitering Munition. — Israel Aerospace Industries
https://www.dawn.com/news/1909385/all-you-need-to-know-about-israel-made-harop-drones-used-by-india-in-pakistan
