Israel Fast Tracks Emergency Response Net
By Barbara Opall-Rome 11:37 a.m. EST January 24, 2015
http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/homeland-security/2015/01/22/israel-fast-tracks-emergency-response-net/22155299/

TEL AVIV — Israel's Homefront Command is accelerating plans to field a
national emergency response C4I network ahead of threatened retaliation by
Iran and Hezbollah for last week's aerial assassination strikes in Syria.

A general officer of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and two midlevel
Hezbollah commanders were among those killed in the Jan. 18 attack on a
convoy travelling just north of the Israeli-Syrian border.

In response, Tehran's Supreme National Security Council vowed that
Hezbollah, its Lebanon-based ally, would avenge the attacks "with crushing
force, revolutionary determination, and at a time and place of its
choosing."

In keeping with its policy of ambiguity on operations conducted in Iran,
Syria and Lebanon over the past decade, Israel is not confirming its role in
the attack.

However, UN monitors at the border reported the breach of Syrian airspace by
Israeli-manned aircraft and experts here note that Israel is the only force
in the region practiced in the art of precision strikes against moving
targets.

As Israel continues to remain mum, it is ramping up readiness at diplomatic
facilities abroad and augmenting defenses at home through intensified air
patrols, crack troops at the border and deployment of Iron Dome intercepting
batteries.

Additionally, it is fast-tracking the fielding of Shu'al, which translates
to Fox, yet is an acronym for National Homefront Command and Control
network.

Developed by Tel Aviv-based TSG, part of the multinational Ness Group,
Shu'al will allow military and civilian emergency responders to share
real-time video, maps, messages and other data on a common C4I network.

Initial deployment was slated for March to enable its use in a major annual
homefront defense drill, dubbed Turning Point, scheduled in May. Homefront
Command planned to certify it as fully operational following its use on a
mass scale in support of the annual drill.

"It's a national-level network that we plan to declare fully operational
after the drill in May," said Lt. Col. Gil Hoffman, the recently retired
chief C4I officer of Homefront Command.

"It will bring connectivity not only to the IDF and Israel Police, but to
firefighters, Magen David Adom [Israel's equivalent to the Red Cross] and
all other organizations operating in the homefront domain," Hoffman said in
a Jan. 12 interview.

But given threatened fallout from the Jan. 18 assassination strikes, defense
and industry sources said they may not need to wait for Turning Point to
operationally test and certify the new network.

The specter of renewed rocket and missile attacks from Lebanon, Hezbollah's
home theater, and/or Syria, where the Shiite organization is fighting to
preserve the Bashar al-Assad regime, is driving efforts for its possible
debut under fire.

Homefront Command has planning and budget authority for Shu'al, while the
Maof engineering department of the IDF's C4I Directorate is managing
development and project implementation with the R&D Directorate of Israel's
Ministry of Defense.

Col. Yossi Mashiah, the recently retired director of Maof, said Shu'al would
support homefront operators much in the way that Tzayad, the Army's digital
network, enhances interoperability among war fighters.

"It will bring one network to all the echelons from the single soldier to
the highest level of national command, regardless of whether they're
communicating through cellular, satellite, Wifi or LAN [Local Area
Network]," he said.

Gali Michaeli, TSG's vice president of Homeland Security, said Shu'al marks
the next-generation network for command and control of emergency response
operations. The company was the IDF's contractor of choice for Kingdom, the
current network supporting Homefront Command, which has been operational
since 2007.

"The Shu'al system is an important capability for situations of crises when
operators from different worlds must respond to natural or manmade
disasters. It's based on a holistic concept that creates a common language,
a single national situational picture and allows for effective management of
resources," he said.

"TSG is proud of its partnership with Homefront Command, the IDF and the C4I
Branch in realizing this vision for a national network for emergency
response," he said.

Email: bopallrome@defensenews.com