"This battery was deployed around Ashkelon for security reasons, This is the second system to become operational after the deployment around Beersheva"

The Israeli army on Monday deployed a second battery of its Iron Dome short-range missile defence system, this time around the southern port city of Ashkelon, a military spokeswoman said.
  
"This battery was deployed around Ashkelon for security reasons, This is the second system to become operational after the deployment around Beersheva," she said, without giving further details.
 
 The first battery of the multi-million dollar system came into operation on March 27 outside the southern desert city of Beersheva, just days after it was hit by several Grad rockets fired by militants from the northern Gaza Strip.
  
The defence system, the first of its kind in the world and still at the experimental stage, is not yet able to provide complete protection against the hundreds of rockets fired from Gaza, officials have said.
  
On Sunday, Defence Minister Ehud Barak said Israel would raise to six the number of Iron Dome batteries in operation over the next two years. The system, developed by Israel's Rafael Advanced Defence Systems with the help of US funding, is designed to intercept rockets and artillery shells  fired from a range of between four and 70 kilometres (three and 45 miles).