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Israel shoots down Syrian drone over Golan hours after Damascus airport ‘incident’
RT,
27
April, 2017
The
IDF has fired a Patriot missile that allegedly destroyed a Syrian
drone over the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights hours after an
‘incident’ near Damascus International Airport, widely reported
as an alleged Israeli strike on Hezbollah arms depot.
Confirming
that the Patriot missile successfully intercepted the unmanned aerial
vehicle over the Golan Heights, the IDF stressed that the UAV was
under Israeli Air Force’s “full surveillance” during the brief
time it was in “Israeli airspace.”
“The
IDF will not allow any breach of Israel’s airspace and will act
against any attempt of infiltration,” the army said in a statement,
according to the Times of Israel and Haaretz reports.
Initially
the IDF said that it shot down “a target” or an “unidentified
aircraft” over the Golan Heights, but it was not immediately clear
what kind of target that was. The army later confirmed that it was an
apparent Syrian drone
Security
camera footage, shared by Israeli Channel 1 editor Amichai Stein,
showed the moment a Patriot missile was launched to take down the
drone.
#BREAKING: Patriot missile was fired from a base in northern Israel after an unidentified aircraft was detected in the sky
The
drone incident comes after the official Syrian state news agency
SANA, citing an unnamed military source, accused Israel of striking a
military installation near Damascus International Airport.
“A
military position southwest of Damascus International Airport was
exposed to an Israeli aggression with several missiles fired from
inside the occupied territories at dawn on Thursday causing
explosions in the place and leaving some material losses,” a
military source told SANA. The source added that the alleged Israeli
strikes are a “desperate attempt” to raise the “collapsed
morale of terrorist groups” amid the Syrian army advance.
While
Israel has neither officially confirmed nor denied striking targets
inside Syria, a “regional” intelligence source told Reuters that
an Israeli attack hit Hezbollah’s arms supply hub near Damascus
airport.
When
contacted by RT to provide any details on the explosions near
Damascus Airport, the IDF press office repeatedly declined to comment
on the incident.
Earlier
in the day, however, Israeli Intelligence Minister Israel Katz said
that the “incident” in the vicinity of Damascus International
Airport was in line with Israel’s policies.
“The
incident in Syria corresponds completely with Israel’s policy to
act to prevent Iran’s smuggling of advanced weapons via Syria to
Hezbollah in Iran,” Katz told Israeli Army Radio, according to
Reuters.
“Naturally,
I don’t want to elaborate on this,” Katz added.
Israel
has been repeatedly accused – but rarely admitted – of carrying
out a number of strikes in Syria since 2011 targeting arms convoys of
its Lebanese foe Hezbollah.
In
mid-March, Israel confirmed that its jets conducted airstrikes near
Palmyra, allegedly destroying “advanced arms” destined to
Hezbollah. In response, Syria’s air defense forces fired
anti-aircraft missiles at the planes as they were returning from
their mission. Syria warned that scud missiles would be fired towards
Israeli targets if Israel carried out any further airstrikes in the
war-torn country.
The
Russian Foreign ministry on Thursday criticized any “aggression”
against Syria, without pinning blame for the Damascus airport
incident on any party.
“Moscow
condemns acts of aggression against Syria” and calls on everyone to
“act within the framework of respecting the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of Syria,” spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.
Iran’s
Defense Minister Hossein Dehghan meanwhile condemned the strikes,
saying in an interview with RT that they “help terrorists.”
“The
Syrian state and its army are progressing. They are advancing and
gaining territories from the terrorists,” the official told RT
while on a visit to Moscow. “When it becomes worse for the
terrorists, the strikes follow, bringing them a message saying: 'We
are defending and protecting you, so don’t worry and if it’s
necessary we’ll intervene.' In my opinion, those operations help
terrorists.”
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