As the conflict between two nuclear-armed neighbors escalates, Pakistan claims it destroyed more than two dozen Israeli-made Harop drones launched by India, including during an attack on an air defense system in Lahore. India claims it destroyed that system, but did not acknowledge the use or loss of any Harops. Each side also accuses the other of launching missile attacks. You can catch up on the initial outbreak of open hostilities in our previous coverage here.
Before moving forward, we must note that the situation is very murky and a flood of blanket claims and assumptions are emanating from both sides, which has overrun social media. So we have to deal with claims as such until we have more comprehensive proof.
“Pakistan Armed Forces have so far shot down 25 Israeli-made Harop drones,” the Pakistani Defense Ministry claimed in a statement. “Debris of Israeli-made Harop drones is being recovered from various areas across Pakistan.”
Video emerged on social media purporting to show Harop drone remnants recovered by Pakistani forces.
In addition, a video was posted on X claiming that Pakistani forces used what appears to be an Oerlikon GDF-002 35mm twin autocannon short-range air defense system (SHORAD) to defend against those drones. The War Zone cannot independently verify these claims.
The Pakistani military previously said one drone attacked a military target near the eastern city of Lahore, causing damage and wounding soldiers, the Times of Israel noted.
India sent Israeli Harop drones to multiple locations, including the two largest cities of Karachi and Lahore, and their debris is being collected, Pakistan military spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said, according to the publication.
“Indian drones continue to be sent into Pakistan airspace…(India) will continue to pay dearly for this naked aggression,” he said.
Indian officials said their forces carried out a response to Pakistan’s attacks on its military installations, but did not offer specifics on what weapons were used.
“Today morning Indian Armed Forces targeted Air Defense Radars and systems at a number of locations in Pakistan,” the Indian Defense Ministry (MoD) said in a statement on Thursday. “Indian response has been in the same domain with the same intensity as Pakistan. It has been reliably learnt that an Air Defense system at Lahore has been neutralized.”
While India did not say what it used to attack the Pakistani air defenses, it makes some sense that it would use Harops. Made by Israel Aircraft Industry (IAI), these loitering munitions are often used as Suppression/Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses (SEAD/DEAD) weapon systems, designed to home in on an enemy’s radio frequency-emitting air defense sensor capabilities.
Armed with a 50-pound warhead, the Harop uses its camera system and operator to track and engage moving targets or its radiation seeker to sniff out and attack radar sites on its own. It can even be equipped for both missions at the same time, so that if a radar site were to go offline after being detected, the Harop can fly to its location and use electro-optical targeting to locate and kill it. It can also hit many other kinds of ground targets — moving or static — as well. Harop can fly for about six hours or about 600 miles after being launched by a truck- or ship-mounted canister. Once in the air, it can be operated by man-in-the-loop control or it can go about its mission autonomously.
Harop was put to use with devastating results by the Azeris in the spring of 2021, during fighting with the Armenians. The attack drone supposedly hit a bus full of soldiers, killing six and destroying the bus. You can read more about them in our story here and here.
Though India made no mention of the Harops, officials in New Delhi said its integrated air defense and counter-unmanned aerial systems grid “came into action Wednesday night and took down several Pakistani armed drones, loitering munitions and missiles that were targeting 15 military installations, including IAF bases in Pathankot and Srinagar,” the Indian ThePrint news outlet reported on Thursday.
India used its Russian-made S-400, indigenous Akash and several other surface-to-air missile systems, as well as integrated counter-drone systems that included hand-held jamming devices, to thwart “Pakistan’s escalatory military action,” the publication reported. “The ‘debris of these attacks is now being recovered from a number of locations that prove the Pakistani attacks,’ the MoD statement said.”
The primary targets of the Pakistan missiles and drones were the “[Indian Air Force] stations in some of these locations and radar stations in some,” ThePrint posited, citing its sources. “Ever since the launch of Operation Sindoor, the air defense systems were put on high alert along the western sector, they added.”
Casualties are starting to mount as the two sides trade drone and missile volleys and fighting intensifies along the Line of Control in the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region.
It appears that Jammu city, in Indian-administered Kashmir, came under attack Thursday, an Indian Army spokesperson told CNN.
“We don’t have any more details. At this point, we are trying to ascertain the situation. A blackout is in place,” the spokesperson said. “Loud explosions—bombing, shelling, or missile strikes suspected,” Shesh Paul Vaid, former director general of Jammu and Kashmir police, said in a post on X, and he added there is currently a blackout.
Air raid sirens were activated in Islamabad, Pakistan, but it is unclear if there was any attack there.
“A Pakistani military official said at least 31 civilians were killed Wednesday in what India dubbed ‘Operation Sindoor,’ which New Delhi said targeted ‘terrorist infrastructure,’” CNN reported. “On the Indian side of the de facto border that divides Kashmir, cross-border Pakistani shelling has killed at least 16 people, India’s defense ministry said.”
Meanwhile, Pakistan said it has killed 40 to 50 Indian soldiers along the de facto border in Kashmir, the network reported.
So far, U.S. military officials have declined to comment on this conflict. On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.
“The Secretary emphasized the need for immediate de-escalation. He expressed U.S. support for direct dialogue between India and Pakistan and encouraged continued efforts to improve communications,” he said, according to a readout provided by spokesperson Tammy Bruce. “The Secretary reiterated his condolences for the horrific terrorist attack in Pahalgam and reaffirmed the United States’ commitment to work with India in the fight against terrorism.”
The Indian government has said its latest strikes were retaliation for the terrorist attack in Pahalgam that killed 26 civilians in Kashmir last month. Pakistan denies any involvement in that incident.
This is a developing story. We will update it as more news comes in.
Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com