EXCLUSIVE: As U.S., Israeli and allied forces continue to intercept the vast majority of Iranian missiles and drones, a new report and expert analysis reveal a growing concern behind the headline success: the cost and sustainability of the defense itself.

More than 90% of Iranian projectiles have been intercepted during the war, according to a report obtained by Fox News Digital from the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), thanks to a layered regional air defense system built during years of coordination.

But beneath that success lies a widening imbalance that could shape the next phase of the conflict.

The report highlights a critical trend: Iran’s least expensive weapons are proving the most disruptive and are draining costly U.S. and Israeli interceptors.

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The current air defense architecture, integrating U.S., Israeli and Arab systems, has proven highly effective at stopping incoming threats. Early warning systems, shared radar coverage and pre-positioned assets have allowed multiple countries to work together to defeat Iranian missiles and drones.

During a press briefing on Wednesday, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “More than 9,000 enemy targets have been struck to date … Iran’s ballistic missile attacks and drone attacks are down by roughly 90%,” she said, adding that U.S. forces have also destroyed more than 140 Iranian naval vessels, including nearly 50 mine layers.

A surge of U.S. assets before the war, including Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), batteries, Patriot systems, two carrier strike groups and roughly 200 fighter aircraft, helped absorb Iran’s opening salvos and maintain high interception rates, according to JINSA’s report.

But Ari Cicurel, associate director of foreign policy at JINSA and author of the report, said focusing only on interception percentages misses the bigger picture.

“Overall high missile and drone interception rates have been important but only tell part of the story,” Cicurel told Fox News Digital. “Iran came into this war with a deliberate plan to dismantle the architecture that makes those intercepts possible. It has struck energy infrastructure to upset markets and used cluster munitions to achieve higher hit rates.”

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Danny Citrinowicz, a Middle East and national security expert at Institute for National Security Studies and a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council, said that imbalance is at the heart of the problem. 

“There needs to be a change in the equation,” he told Fox News Digital. “The Iranians are launching drones that cost around $30,000, and we are using missiles that cost millions of dollars to intercept them. That gap is a very problematic one.”

He added that the same dynamic applies to ballistic missiles.

“Building a missile in Iran may cost a few hundred thousand dollars, while the interceptor costs millions, especially when we talk about systems like Arrow,” he said. “It’s easier and quicker to produce missiles than it is to build interceptors. That’s not a secret.”

This cost imbalance is feeding into a broader concern: interceptor depletion.

The JINSA report warns that stockpiles across the region are already under strain. Some Gulf states have used a significant portion of their interceptor inventories, with estimates suggesting Bahrain may have expended up to 87% of its Patriot missiles, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait have used roughly 75% and Qatar has used roughly 40%. 

Israel is also facing mounting pressure. While officials have not publicly confirmed stockpile levels, the report notes signs of rationing, including decisions not to intercept certain cluster-munition threats in order to conserve more advanced interceptors.

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Citrinowicz said that dynamics become more acute the longer the war continues.

“We are now several weeks into the war, and even if the salvos are limited, the issue of interceptors becomes more significant over time,” he said.

Iran has adapted its tactics accordingly, shifting from large barrages to smaller, more frequent attacks designed to maintain constant pressure while gradually draining defensive resources.

These persistent salvos, even if limited in size, force defenders to remain on high alert and continue expending interceptors, accelerating the depletion of already finite stockpiles.

The report underscores that drones pose a unique challenge compared to ballistic missiles.

Unlike missiles, which rely on large launchers and leave detectable signatures, drones can be launched from mobile platforms and can fly at low altitudes that make them harder for radar systems to detect.

For example, A Shahed-136 weighs roughly 200 kilograms and launches from an angled rail mounted on a pickup truck, after which the crew can quickly relocate. That simpler launch profile makes it easier for Iran to disperse, conceal and fire under pressure, the report stated.

Iran also has incorporated lessons from the war in Ukraine, deploying more advanced drones, including those guided by fiber-optic cables that are immune to electronic jamming, and faster variants powered by jet engines.

These innovations complicate interception timelines and increase the likelihood of successful strikes, even against otherwise effective defense systems.

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Despite these challenges, the report emphasizes that the defensive architecture has not failed.

“The architecture has held, but the trajectory is moving in the wrong direction,” Cicurel said. “Reversing it requires moving assets to where the pressure is greatest, hunting Iranian launchers and drones more aggressively, and convoying ships through the Gulf.”

Even with high interception rates, the broader impact of the attacks is being felt.

Iranian strikes on energy infrastructure and shipping have driven oil prices higher and disrupted traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, demonstrating that air defense alone cannot prevent economic and strategic consequences.

The emerging picture is not one of failing defenses, but of a system under growing strain.

As long as Iran can produce cheap drones and missiles faster than the U.S., Israel and their partners can produce interceptors, the balance may gradually shift.

“As long as the war continues,” Citrinowicz said, “the key question will be whether Iran can produce missiles faster than we can produce interceptors.”

Rep. Pramila Jayapal., D-Wash., did not hold back when criticizing ICE and CBP as the Homeland Security shutdown drags on.

Jayapal told reporters on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, “We want actual reforms to the way ICE operates, and CBP [Border Patrol] also. That’s the whole point. We don’t want ICE and CBP murdering people on our streets and bashing down doors. So, as long as there’s no reforms, I think we’re not interested.”

This comes as House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and the GOP at large are blaming Democrats as Americans face long security lines at airports while a Department of Homeland Security funding lapse and related department shutdown drag on.

“The Democrat’s DHS shutdown strategy is clear: Block paychecks for TSA officers and force Americans to wait in lines at airports across the country — while letting criminal illegal aliens skip the line to enter the country. It’s madness,” Johnson declared in a Tuesday post on X.

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Like the rest of the agencies that operate under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), funding for TSA ran dry on Feb. 14 over Democrat-led demands to reform ICE, the agency at the heart of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Democrats have conditioned their support for DHS funding on a ban on masks for ICE agents, stiffer warrant requirements for apprehending suspects in public and a ban on roaming patrols, among other changes.

Trump has deployed ICE agents to airports across the country, a move some Democrats have opposed.

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“There’s absolutely no reason for him to do that,” said Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas. “There’s a bipartisan deal to fund TSA. [Trump] has put a stop to it.”

Instead of using ICE to meet security needs at airports, Escobar said that Congress should pass a proposal that separates funding for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) from the gridlock.

Fellow Democrat Rep. Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz., echoed Escobar’s condemnation of the deployment.

“I think it’s a horrible, horrible idea that’s just going to cause more problems,” Grijalva said.

Jayapal also shared her opposition to ICE being sent to airports, in a statement on X:

In part, she wrote, “Democrats are ready to pass funding to ensure that TSA workers are immediately paid, but instead, Trump and Republicans now want to deploy ICE agents to airports across the country to try and once again terrorize our communities.”

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TSA Deputy Administrator Ha Nguyen McNeill testified on Capitol Hill Wednesday that the agency is experiencing the highest wait times in its history.

“We have already lost over 480 TSOs this shutdown, and our callout rates have accelerated as our workforce was still reeling from the last shutdown,” McNeill noted.

New DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin was sworn into the role on Tuesday.

In part of a Tuesday post on X, Mullin noted that he is “committed to safeguarding the American people and protecting the homeland.”

“My first priority is to end the partisan fighting and reopen the U.S. Department of Homeland Security as a matter of national security,” he said.

Fox News Digital has reached out to DHS for comment.

Fox News’ Leo Briceno, Alex Nitzberg, Danielle Wallace, Alexandra Koch and Emma Bussey contributed to this report.

Princess Beatrice is said to be privately struggling as she attempts to navigate the ongoing scandals surrounding her parents.

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Sarah Ferguson, the former Duke and Duchess of York, appeared in the U.S. Department of Justice’s Jan. 30 release of files related to the investigation of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Neither has been charged, and being named does not indicate wrongdoing.

“The reality is Princess Beatrice is under a lot of pressure at the moment,” royal expert Ian Pelham Turner told Fox News Digital. “She’s trying to support her father without annoying the royal family, especially her cousin and heir to the throne, Prince William.”

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“Secondly, it is rumored that her mother wishes to move to Portugal,” Turner noted.

British broadcaster and photographer Helena Chard also told Fox News Digital that Beatrice is “deeply worried and distraught about her wider family life.”

“She can’t come to terms with negative revelations, which have certainly taken a toll,” Chard claimed.

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Turner and Chard’s statements came shortly after a source close to Beatrice and her husband, Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, told People magazine that any rumors about marital woes between them are “complete nonsense.”

On March 22, the Mail on Sunday reported that there was a “distance” between the couple amid the ongoing scandals surrounding Beatrice’s parents.

“The source close to Beatrice and Edoardo stating any marital difficulties between the couple are ‘complete nonsense’ is a traditional ‘never complain, never explain’ royal message to be communicated to the world,” said Turner.

“Hopefully Edoardo is supporting Beatrice at this time of great strain as rumors abound,” he said. “One fact to consider is who is spreading these rumors and who may want to attack Beatrice right now with gossip and innuendo. One theory is that some powerful person is … sending a warning sign that if she supports her family, more attacks on her marriage could follow.”

Beatrice, 37, and Mozzi, 42, married in 2020 and share two children. The Mail on Sunday reported that while Beatrice has been quietly supporting her parents, Mozzi has immersed himself in work as a property developer.

“Things haven’t been great for a while between them, but Beatrice has been determined to soldier on and forge a path through,” a source told the outlet.

“Beatrice is quite different from her sister, Princess Eugenie. She really wants to, almost naively, see the good in people and will turn a blind eye to uncomfortable truths — that is why she was blind to her father’s behavior, and the same is true of her belief in Edo.”

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“She wants to stay together, but he seems more and more distracted by work and travel,” the source said. “Just when she needs him most, he’s been pulling away.”

Days after the DOJ’s Epstein file release, Mozzi recapped his work trip to Miami and Palm Beach in an Instagram video.

“He’s really worried his in-laws will affect his business,” the source told the outlet, noting that his Banda Property “has been taking off lately, and he’s found some great investors among the wealthy Cotswolds set. But it’s taking up a lot of his time and energy. He’s all about himself at the moment. You have to feel for Beatrice.”

“There’s been distance between them with his much-increased work travel lately, which he has been posting out [on social media] heavily in a way he didn’t before,” added another source to the outlet.

Fox News Digital reached out to Kensington Palace for comment.

“My sources say Beatrice’s relationship with her husband, Edoardo, is frayed,” Chard said. “Others have said it is in tatters over the scandals. It is said he is keeping his distance from any further drama … He is worried his business will be negatively affected.”

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But not everyone agrees. Royal commentator Meredith Constant pointed out to Fox News Digital that as Andrew lies low, the British media has begun scrutinizing the York sisters.

“Andrew news has gone cold recently,” Constant said. “The focus has moved to his daughters. In an attempt to find something to talk about, outlets have moved on to their marriages. Edo has business in other countries. I don’t think his time in Florida would be reported on if outlets weren’t looking for signs that there’s trouble in paradise.”

“I also find it hard to believe that Edo is now concerned about how his father-in-law impacts his business,” said Constant. 

“He married Beatrice in 2020; that was after the disastrous ‘Newsnight’ interview where he claimed he didn’t sweat and therefore couldn’t have danced with [Epstein accuser] Virginia [Giuffre], well past his time as U.K. Trade Envoy, which has always been shrouded in scandal.”

“The only thing that’s new here is the appearance of accountability and the rumors that William asked his cousins to submit to a financial audit,” Constant added.

A source told People that Andrew’s daughters have been prioritizing their families. Both women are mothers of young children.

“They’re like a locked ship right now,” a friend told the outlet.

“They are tarnished by this,” said royal author Ingrid Seward. “It has affected their lives a great deal.”

Beatrice and Mozzi were also spotted together at a birthday party on March 20 in London. The photographs were published by the Daily Mail.

Sources agreed that Mozzi has been prioritizing his future. The eldest son of Count Alessandro Mapelli Mozzi will one day inherit his family’s ancestral seat, the 18th-century Villa Mapelli Mozzi palazzo in northern Italy, People reported. He launched Banda, a property development and interior design company, in his early 20s.

The royals will also focus on following the late Queen Elizabeth II’s mantra — “keep calm and carry on.”

“We’re moving into a busy season for the royal family,” said Constant. “King Charles’ big U.S. visit is next month. Then we have events like the Royal Maundy Service at Easter, the RHS Garden Party, Trooping the Colour and more. They would not want the focus on Andrew or his immediate family. They will be doing everything to contain any potentially negative stories.”

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British royals expert Hilary Fordwich previously claimed to Fox News Digital that the York sisters have been struggling with their disgraceful father’s explosive arrest, which took place on Feb. 19, his 66th birthday. The whereabouts of their mother are also currently unknown. Fox News Digital reached out to a spokesperson for Ferguson, 66, for comment.

“While both daughters were loyal to their parents, they now face the untenable choice of whether salvaging their own futures must prevail, given even their maiden York name is so toxic,” said Fordwich.

“They have been understandably distressed by the Epstein file contents regarding both their parents, but will no doubt create even more visible distance from their parents while perhaps still supporting them privately,” Fordwich said. “They now have tough decisions to make. All children faced with the despicable behavior of their parents have to make such a choice.”