INS Magen

INS Magen (Shield) is a Sa'ar 6-class corvette of the Israeli Navy's Shayetet 3 fleet. She is the first ship of her class to be commissioned.

Development and design
The Sa'ar 6-class corvettes' design will be loosely based on the German Braunschweig-class corvette, but with engineering changes to accommodate Israeli-built sensors and missiles such as the Barak 8 and the naval Iron Dome system. Elbit Systems has been awarded the contract to design and build the electronic warfare (EW) suites for the ships.

The Sa'ar 6-class vessels have a displacement of almost 1,900 tons at full load and is 90 m long. They are armed with an Oto Melara 76 mm main gun, two Typhoon Weapon Stations, 32 vertical launch cells for Barak-8 surface-to-air missiles, 40 cells for the C-Dome point defense system, 16 anti-ship missiles Gabriel V. the EL/M-2248 MF-STAR AESA radar, and two 324 mm torpedo launchers. They have hangar space and a platform able to accommodate a medium class SH-60-type helicopter.

Construction and career
She was laid down on 7 February 2018 and launched on 12 May 2019 at German Naval Yards and ThyssenKrupp in Kiel. She was handed over to Israeli Navy on 2 December and commissioned on 11 November 2020. In Haifa in September 2022, the vessel's 76/62 rapid-fire main gun was ceremonially accepted for her and her sister ship Oz.

Operational history
In February 2022, the INS Magen took part in an exercise in the Mediterranean. Among other things, missile defense and unmanned vehicles were tested. During the exercise, training was given to repel missiles from Iran.

It was also deployed in the red sea following Houthi attacks on Israeli and non-Israeli ships during the Red Sea crisis

On 8th April 2024 the C-Dome battery of the Sa'ar 6-class corvette INS Magen scored the first operational interception of the system when it shot down a UAV drone near Eilat.