Israel Joins The Fighting, Shoots Down Syrian Warplane Which Acted In “Threatening Manner”

SOURCE: ZERO HEDGE

Whether as a result of recent icy to quite icy diplomatic relations between the two nations, or just because it has other motives, Israel had clearly abstained from joining the US effort to contain the CIA-created ISIS terrorist juggernaut. However, overnight, with the US finally doing what Israel has hoped it would do for so long, namely being engaged in a bombing campaign of Syria (recall that it was Israel which was one of the biggest supporters of a US-led military intervention in Syria in the summer of 2013), it decided “hell, why not” and joined the fray, when shortly before 3 am Eastern time, this hit:

• ISRAELI SAYS IT DOWNED SYRIAN AIRCRAFT IN ISRAELI AIRSPACE
• ISRAELI ARMY SAYS DOWNED SYRIAN AIRCRAFT WAS FIGHTER JET

Quite notable because it was the first time in three decades that Israel had downed a Syrian warplane, so Israel needed a strong pretext for such aggression. An aggression, incidentally, not against ISIS, but Assad’s regime itself, which clearly is what Obama’s latest operation is all about – to take down a sovereign while doing the bidding of Qatar and Saudi Arabia, just like in 2013.

And then Israel, oddly, revised the story:

• ISRAEL ARMY SHOOTS DOWN SYRIAN WARPLANE NEAR BORDER

So… it may not have been in Israel airspace. But then, why? Oh, here’s why:

• ISRAEL’S YA’ALON SAYS SYRIAN JET ACTED IN ‘THREATENING MANNER’

Just how does a jet act in a “threatening manner” - isn‘t a fighter jet’s very premise to exist in a threatening manner?

In any event, Israel is now part of the onslaught, which means that the carve up of Syria’s territory, with Assad’s ouster now firmly priced in, has begun. 

Something tells us that whatever Qatar does not take, and it will mostly need a corridor of land so its nat gas pipeline can traverse the country and enter Europe with Brussel’s blessing since this would crush Putin’s leverage over Europe, will be handed over to “US allies” in the region.

Here is Reuters’ take on the event:

Israel shot down a Syrian warplane on Tuesday, saying the aircraft crossed the battle lines of Syria’s civil war and flew over the Israeli-held Golan Heights, perhaps by accident. The incident coincided with but did not appear to be directly related to air strikes the United States and Gulf Arab allies mounted on Islamic State strongholds in Syria.

But it presented another challenge to Israel’s oft-stated desire to stay on the sidelines of a conflict on its northern doorstep, in which al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front rebels took over a border crossing on the Golan last month.

The Israeli military said its U.S.-made Patriot missile air defence system shot down a Syrian Russian-built Sukhoi fighter plane that had “infiltrated Israeli airspace” over the territory, captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

Of course, Syria’s version of events is quite different, namely that the warplane was not over Israel territory, meaning following the US act of aggression against a sovereign, Israel was merely piggybacking and also declaring war on the Assad regime:

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks violence in the civil war, said the warplane had been bombing areas outside Quneitra, a Syrian town near the Israeli-held side of the frontier, at the time it was shot down. It said the pilot had bailed out. Syria described the downing of the aircraft as an act of aggression.

Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon, commenting on the incident, said Israel “will not allow any element – neither a state nor a terrorist group – to threaten our security and violate our sovereignty”.

Israeli military sources said the plane apparently crossed by accident into Israeli-controlled airspace.

In his statement, Yaalon also seemed to raise that possibility, saying Israel would respond strongly to perceived threats “whether they stemmed from a mistake or were deliberate”.

Or weren’t a mistake at all, and the attack was just another provocation seeking to escalate what is already a war of interenational aggression headed by a US-led coalition.

So while the West, and Arab nations have tipped their hand, it now remains to be seen just how, and on whose side, Russia and China will join this conflict which is a nothing but a rerun of the Syrian near-war of summer 2013, instigated by the grand puppet masters, Qatar and Saudi Arabia’s Bandar bin Sultan.