Israel shoots down Syrian fighter jet when it violated airspace over Golan Heights
Israeli army officials confirmed that they shot down a Syrian fighter jet which flew into the Golan Heights airspace on Tuesday.
The remarks claim it was “apparently a MiG-21 fighter jet which was shot down by a surface-to-air missile. The wreckage landed on the Syrian-controlled side of the plateau,” one Sept. 24 report transcribed.
photo Ron Almo
It was confirmed that the pilot bailed out of the plane in time as the incident was the first time in 30 years that Israel downed a Syrian plane.
While the U.S. attacks on the Islamic State in Syria this week, Israel has continued silence and non-intervention against the Sunni extremists.
Syria has called the shooting an act of aggression but Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon defended the act. Israel “will not allow any element — neither a state nor a terrorist group — to threaten our security and violate our sovereignty,” he said.
Israeli authorities reported that the plane may have crossed into the Israel-controlled airspace by mistake; Yaalon alluded to the possibility as well when he said that Israel would respond to threats of national security “whether they stemmed from a mistake or were deliberate.”
The Syrian statement made no reference to the Israeli claim that the jet had violated Israeli airspace.
In August, Israel shot down a drone that had entered its side of the Golan Heights from Syria.
UN forces oversee the buffer zone in the Golan Heights which was seized by Israel in 1967 and annexed in 1981. The area stretches from Lebanon in the north to Jordan in the south.
