Israeli CEO reveals how IDF's use of robotics impacts situation on battlefields

The CEO of an Israeli defense robotics company recently discussed how autonomous systems have reshaped the country's military operations during the ongoing conflict and what that means for the future of warfare.

In an interview with Breaking Defence, Yossi Wolf, the CEO of Roboteam Defence, highlighted the dramatic transformation on the battlefield driven by the integration of robotics. “You see it in Ukraine and the Israel Defence Forces,” he said, emphasising how war accelerates technological shifts.

Wolf specifically pointed to the surge in unmanned systems, including ground robots, which he described as “very operational in the Gaza war.” He explained that before the outbreak of the current war—sparked by Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7—robotics played a relatively minor and more legally restricted role in military planning.

“Before the war, you had no approval for having weapons on the robots,” he noted. But now, Israel’s conventional military units—including infantry and armour—have embraced weaponised robotics. “That’s the big change is that the big army put it in,” he emphasised.

The integration of commercially available unmanned systems into military operations has also marked a “huge change from the past,” Wolf added.

According to Breaking Defence, the Israel Defence Forces received the Spark UAV in September 2023, just weeks before the war, which was seen as a step toward fifth-generation drone warfare. Since then, the Israeli Air Force has created a dedicated drone squadron. The IDF has also introduced unmanned versions of M113 armoured personnel carriers and D9 bulldozers into combat.

Wolf said the IDF has begun arming small drones with grenades—an initiative led by the IDF’s Yiftah unit, which focuses on tactical innovation. “We connect the drones with the unmanned ground vehicles [UGVs] and then you get a new orchestra of UGVs talking with each other and shooting,” he explained.

The increased deployment of robotic platforms has necessitated new training programs for soldiers. According to Wolf, at least three units within the IDF now specialize in robotics instruction: the elite Lotar counter-terror unit, the combat engineers of Yahalom, and the IDF’s engineering school, Balatz.

Many of the robotic tools used today are either built or adapted in-house by the IDF, giving the military flexibility without relying solely on outside contractors. For example, the IDF has repurposed ageing M113 vehicles into unmanned platforms for frontline use.

Still, companies like Roboteam continue to play a key role in supporting the IDF. One innovation from Roboteam is the “Robox,” a modular container that can be deployed in the field. “They [the army] can put the container down, and it has a fleet of robots with large robots and a drone, and they enable regular infantry to keep the perimeter because it keeps distance between themselves and the enemy,” Wolf said.

These robotic and drone systems, aided by artificial intelligence but not fully controlled by it, can collaborate to complete complex missions. As the article highlights, smaller robots are capable of entering tunnels—dangerous tasks typically reserved for soldiers. Because these machines often operate at the frontline, they are designed to be expendable and scalable.

Wolf added that the use of low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites has significantly improved communication between robotic platforms, making coordinated operations more efficient.

By Nazrin Sadigova