BICOM

In the fifth such incident during the past week, stray mortars from fighting in Syria landed on the Israeli Golan Heights yesterday, prompting the IDF to return fire.

Three mortars in total landed in Israel, assumed to be stray fire from the Syrian civil war. It constitutes more rockets fired into Israel from Syria in a single day than at any other recent point. No injuries or damage was reported. Israel responded by striking Syrian army artillery positions last night. As the nominal ruling power, Israel holds the Syrian government responsible for such incidents.

Although the mortars have not caused any injuries, one mortar last week damaged a road. On each occasion, the IDF has responded by returning fire at Syrian army positions. Israel claims it has remained firmly on the sidelines during the five-year Syrian civil war, despite stray fire infrequently landing in Israel.

Earlier in the day, Syrian state television claimed that the Syrian army shot down an Israeli jet and a drone on Tuesday morning, during an IDF response to earlier mortar fire.

The official SANA news agency said: “Our air defences blocked the attack and shot down the military aircraft in Quneitra and a drone west of Sa’sa.”

The IDF swiftly dismissed the claim, but said that anti-aircraft missiles had been fired.

An IDF statement said: “Two surface-to-air missiles were launched from Syria after the mission overnight to target Syrian artillery positions… At no point was the safety of IDF aircraft compromised.”

Writing in Maariv, Yossi Melman said that the anti-aircraft fire was “no chance decision” and “could point to the increasing self-confidence of [Syrian President] Assad’‎s army”.

He added: “‎Israel faces a dilemma. It does not want to heat up the border and find itself being sucked into the vortex of civil war. But it also needs to maintain its credibility and deterrence.”