Israel shoots down Syrian warplane Golan frontier heats up

JERUSALEM / BEIRUT (Reuters) – Israel said it was shot down at Syrian warplane that crossed into the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights on Tuesday, but Damascus said the jet was fired on Sunday.

The incident added a new fuel to the tensions of the Golan, a strategic plateau between the two old enemies and where Israel has been in charge of the Syrian government forces, supported by Russia, in rebel-held ground.

Israeli sirens sounded on the Golan and witnessed the contrails of two flying skyward missiles. The military said it fired Patriot interceptor missiles at a Syrian Sukhoi jet that crossed 2 km (1 mile) into Israeli-controlled airspace, after first trying to warn it off.

"It was shot down and it crashed … most likely in the southern part of the Syrian Golan Heights," Israeli military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Jonathan Conricus said.

"We do not have any information so far about the pilots. "

Syrian state media said, however, that Syrian warplane had been targeted by Israel and hit while conducting raids in Syrian airspace.

"The Israeli enemy confirms its support for the military terrorist groups and targets one of our warplanes, which was striking their groups in the area of ​​Saida on the edge of the Yarmouk Basin in Syrian airspace," the official news agency SANA quoted a military source as saying.

An Israeli military statement appeared to acknowledge that its mission was related to the civil war next door.

"Since morning hours, there has been an increase in the internal fighting in Syria, including an increase in the activity of the Syrian Air Force," the statement said.

It said Israel would "continue to operate against" any breach of a 1974 U.N. armistice deal that established buffer zones on the Golan.

Israel worries that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad might try to defy the demilitarization regime or allow his Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah reinforcements to deploy near the Golan.

The Israeli-Syrian tensions have prompted intercession by Moscow, which feels its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, and top general on Monday for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israeli officials said Netanyahu rebuffed as insufficient to Iran Iranian forces 100 km (62 miles) from the Golan lines.

Also on Monday, Reuters witnesses on the southern edge of the Israeli-occupied Golan saw many warplanes and helicopters in the skies over Syrian territory.

The aircraft were dropping bombs, ostensibly as part of a Russian-backed Syrian government push into areas previously held by anti-government forces.

Anti-aircraft fire could also be seen, targeting the warplanes.

In February, an Israeli F-16 jet was brought down by Syrian anti-aircraft fire.

That warplane crashed in northern Israel while returning from a bombing raid on what was said to be an Iranian military installation in Syria. Both pilots have been injured, one critically.