Israel’s moon landing has failed with the spacecraft crash landing on the moon after an engine failure. Netanyahu says that in two to three years Israel will land a spacecraft on the moon “whole”.

Beresheet, or Genesis in English, failed to land successfully on the moon. Israel is still the fourth country in the world to achieve the feat of touching the moon, but sadly it was not in the way they intended.

“We definitely crashed on surface of moon,” said Opher Doron, general manager of the space division of Israel Aerospace Industries.

He said the spacecraft had scattered into pieces at the planned landing site.

The spacecraft’s engine turned off shortly before landing, he explained, and by the time power was restored, the craft was moving too fast to land safely.

“One of the inertial measurement units failed. And that caused an unfortunate chain of events we’re not sure about,” he said.

“The engine was turned off. The engine was stopped and the spacecraft crashed. That’s all we know.”

Netanyahu, who was at mission control to observe the landing, said Israel will try again.

“If at first you don’t succeed, try again,” says Netanyahu, as the space landing fails. He later said, ““A[n Israeli] spacecraft will land on the moon — whole,” predicting that it will happen in two to three years.

President Reuven Rivlin, who hosted children at his residence in Israel for the landing tried to cheer up those children gathered saying that the Beresheet spacecraft project was a huge accomplishment for Israel.

The moon attempt is “a big and excellent achievement — that has not yet been accomplished,” said Rivlin.

“This is an important night for the State of Israel… there is no need to be disappointed. We need to praise what we accomplished.”

SpaceIL chairman Morris Kahn says he “doesn’t regret for a moment” the decision to back the Israeli spacecraft Beresheet.

“We have a lot to be proud of,” he says.

It is true, the Israeli team has accomplished something special this week becoming the seventh country to orbit the moon and the fourth country to touch the surface of the moon. That landing clearly was not as they intended, but this whole experience has shown that Israel, a tiny country that is battling on all fronts, has the ability to do some amazing things. And we can’t wait to see what they will accomplish in the future.

Update: Beresheet managed to send one final image before it crashed, and it is quite spectacular: