Israel primarily targeted Syria's air defense in 2019 not Iran

By Robert Inlakesh

Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and political analyst, who has lived in and reported from the occupied Palestinian West Bank. He has written for publications such as Mint Press, Mondoweiss, MEMO, and various other outlets. He specializes in analysis of the Middle-East, in particular Palestine-Israel. He also works for Press TV as a European correspondent.

Israel has repeatedly claimed throughout 2019, that it’s airstrikes inside of Syrian territory have targeted Iranian facilities and forces, but according to source and material evidence this claim can be proven to be false. The real target was the assets of the Syrian military itself, a flagrant aggression and violation of Syria’s sovereignty.

Since the 20th of January in 2019, Israel has been launching attacks inside of Syrian territory. The attacks were, according to Israel, carried out against Iranian forces that were supposedly building up in order to launch attacks against the Israelis. Israel has claimed that it has destroyed tens of Iranian bases and killed countless Iranians, a claim repeated throughout Western Mainstream Media and even sometimes Russian media.

But despite such bravado from Israel regarding its alleged attacks on Iranians in Syria, there is no evidence to support such claims. On the contrary, the evidence points to the strikes fulfilling the primary goal of destroying the Syrian Arab Army’s Air Defense Systems. Evidently, attacks on Iranians in Syria have occurred. However, they are small in scope when compared to the primary targets struck.

Below will follow a chronology of Israeli strikes this year against Syrian Air Defense targets, proving categorically that the attacks have primarily destroyed assets belonging to the Syrian military and not Iran.

• On the 20th of January, Israel launched an attack striking areas around the Damascus International Airport. In the attack, two Pantsir units, both of them TELAR’s (Transporter Erector Launcher and Radar) were struck and destroyed.

Long-range S-200 (SA-5) sites near Dumayr Air Base and Khalkhala Air Base were also struck as part of the strikes. This was, in response to these assets [S-200 units]’s firing on Israeli warplanes during the attack on Damascus International Airport. An unspecified number of single-missile launchers and battalion-level fire control radar sites were destroyed by the airstrikes.

Below is satellite evidence showing the two Pantsir units destruction, as well as a Chinese-made JY-27 Early Warning Radar, which was destroyed at the Damascus International Airport.

• During the May 27th attacks, a single ZSU-23-4 Shilka (can prove both via secondary sources) was destroyed at Tal al-Shaar in the Quneitra Governorate. Two SAA members were injured and a lieutenant, from Al-Qaryatayn (Homs Province), was killed in the strike.

• On June the 1st, a modernized S-75 unit belonging to the 781st Air Defense Battalion near Khan al-Shieh was destroyed by Israeli airstrikes. Israel admitted they targeted the Syrian military as part of the June 1st strikes in supposed retaliation for allowing Iranians to operate inside the country.

• On the 11th of June, an Early Warning Radar System was struck and destroyed on the Tal al-Hara mountain in the Dara’a Governance of Southern Syria. This took away Syria’s vision of Israeli strikes coming in from the occupied Golan, which left them open to further attacks.

• On July 1st, five key Early Warning Radars were destroyed during Israel’s large-scale assault on Syria’s air defense system, in which the Israelis fired around 150 cruise missiles. The locations struck were EWR sites at Ad-Dimas, Jamraya, Mezzeh Air Base (Damascus) and near Al-Kisweh in the Damascus region.  An Early Warning Radar system (comprised of three sites linked to one overall network) south of Homs city was additionally targeted and destroyed. For further information on how the June 11th and July the 1st attack were pulled off by Israel, refer to this previous Mint Press article written on the subject.

• On November 20th, significant damage was again inflicted upon Syrian Air Defence. Five Buk-M2E equipment units (including 2 TELAR’s, 1 TEL (Transporter Erector Launcher), one battalion-level command post vehicle, and a battalion-level search radar) located to the south of Damascus, near the Brigade 68 base (Beit Saber area) were destroyed.  

A radar-equipped ZSU-23-4 Shilka in south of Damascus city was also destroyed in the area. Primary and secondary command-and-control sites in the Beit Saber area, as well as at Mezzeh Airbase, and Damascus International Airport were additionally destroyed. Four officers, Maj. Manhal Dib, Capt. Osama As'ad, 1st Lt. Omran Suliamn, and Lt. Jafar Nouraldin were killed in these strikes.

According to Syrian military source, the November 20th Israeli strikes on Syria resulted in the annihilation of approximately $1 billion worth of military equipment. The strikes on the command-and-control sites not only obliterated the coordination mechanism for Syria's air defense operations in the south of the country, but also disrupted the coordination means for the National Defense Forces (which are under the control of Syrian Air Force Intelligence).

This year, Israel has been targeting Syria’s military assets, not Iranian forces inside of Syria. If they were targeting Iranian sites, the proof of damage to Iranian forces would be evident. Yet there is no significant evidence of this and only Israeli allegations. More specifically, Israel has gone after Syria’s Air Defense systems with its countless missions against Syria, which has, according to Syrian military sources, cost the Syrian government roughly $2 billion worth of equipment throughout the course of this year.

Unfortunately, this information has not been reported upon by Mainstream Media and has not been disseminated by Israeli or even Russian media; this is due to the facts being against their national interests.

The Israelis evidently don’t have any interest in distributing this information in full, because the Israeli government maintains that they have been combating Iran in Syria and they know that their targeting of the Syrian military constitutes a flagrant violation of international law and would warrant the justification for a Syrian response to their illegal strikes. Israel seeks an agenda of projecting power over Iran to its general public, and admitting to the true results of its missions would be strategically unwise.

The Russian state media also does not seek to release this information as Russia values Israel as an ally. The dissemination of the facts proving the extent to which Syria has been struck, would also prompt calls for a Russian response, in some form, against the Israeli aggression.

Russia is seen by many as being a part of a type of anti-Western hegemony axis of Resistance. However, its relationship with Syria is based on mutual interests and not purely on ideologically-driven resistance. Even Russian officials have upheld the official story, manufactured by Israel, claiming that the Israeli strikes have been targeting Iran. Claims that do not hold up when examined after each Israeli bombardment.

(The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Press TV.)

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