Wednesday, September 20, 2017

Israeli Patriot missile downs Hizballah drone over Quneitra - debkaFile




by debkaFile

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An Israeli air force Patriot missile Tuesday shot down an Iran-made Hizballah drone over the Syrian border town of Quneitra in the demilitarized zone. The UAV took off from Damascus air port. The IAF first scrambled fighter jets, before launching the missile from a site near the Galilee town of Safed.

“Israel will not allow Iran, Hizballah or other forces to infiltrate or approach its territory in the Golan Heights,” the IDF Spokesperson said in a statement.

DEBKAfile’s military sources report: This was the first time an IDF missile had intercepted a Hizballah drone in Syrian air space. In the past, fighter jets found it hard to down drones entering Golan air space and ended up shooting a Patriot missile. Hizballah’s purpose in sending the drone was apparently to test the state of readiness of IDF air defenses in northern Israel – but no less to see how the Russians would react when an Israeli UAV flew over a Russian-US de-escalation zone in southern Syria, that is under Russian surveillance.


debkaFile

Source:  https://www.debka.com/israeli-patriot-missile-downs-hizballah-drone-quneitra/

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