Putin clears Israel in downing of Russian aircraft
JERUSALEM — Syrian forces accidentally shot down a Russian military plane after an Israeli airstrike on Syrian territory, Kremlin officials said Tuesday, the worst case of friendly fire for Russia in the Syria war.
The accident Monday night briefly caused a crisis in RussiaIsrael relations as the Kremlin first blamed the Israelis, underscoring the risks of escalation from unintended consequences among the different forces operating in Syria.
All 15 Russian service members aboard were killed in the antiaircraft barrage that downed the plane, which had apparently been misidentified by Syrian gunners as Israeli.
Russia intervened in Syria three years ago to help President Bashar Assad prevail in a brutal civil war. The Russians have shown extraordinary tolerance toward Israel’s military, which has carried out more than 200 airstrikes over two years in Syria aimed at Iran-backed Shiite militias that Israel regards as a threat.
Despite initial anger by the Russian military, fears of a Russia-Israel confrontation were dampened by Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin. He placed blame for the downing of the plane, an Ilyushin Il-20 surveillance aircraft, on “a chain of tragic accidental circumstances” and not just on Israel.
Putin drew a distinction between the downing of a Russian fighter plane by Turkey in 2015, which he condemned at the time as a “stab in the back delivered by the accomplices of terrorists,” and Monday’s accident, “because an Israeli plane didn’t shoot our plane down.”
Earlier, the Russian Defense Ministry had angrily accused Israel of hiding its F-16s behind the Russian plane, effectively turning the less stealthy Russian Il-20 into a target for Syria’s anti-aircraft missiles. Russia also suggested that Israel had abused the countries’ coordination system that is meant to avoid such accidents by providing only a minute’s notice before its fighters struck a Syrian air base — too little time for the Russian plane to avoid the crossfire.
“We reserve the right to take adequate measures in response,” Igor Konashenkov, a spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, had said, according to the news agency Interfax.
In a departure from its normal policy of declining to comment on military actions, the Israeli Defense Forces released a lengthy statement that expressed sorrow for the loss of life and held Assad’s government “fully responsible.” It added that Iran and Hezbollah, the Shiite militant group that operates in Syria and that is a bitter enemy of Israel, were also accountable.
Citing an “intolerable threat,” Israel said its jets were targeting a military facility in Syria from which weapons-manufacturing systems were to be transferred to Hezbollah in Lebanon. It added that the anti-aircraft missiles fired by Syria had been fired indiscriminately.
Israel has long enjoyed Russia’s tacit support in pursuing an agenda of preventing Iran from establishing a military presence in Syria and from supplying Hezbollah with weaponry.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has assiduously sought Putin’s acquiescence, with nine visits to Moscow in the past three years. Israeli news media outlets reported Tuesday that Netanyahu planned to speak with the Russian president before the start of Yom Kippur on Tuesday evening.
The shooting down of the plane came on the same day that Russia’s defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, said that Syria would refrain from launching an offensive on Idlib province, the last significant piece of territory in Syria that Assad does not control.
At least 3 million Syrian civilians and 30,000 insurgent fighters, including al-Qaida-linked jihadis, have been cornered in Idlib. Rights advocates had warned of a blood bath there in the event of an all-out assault. Assad has vowed, however, to eventually reassert control over the entire country.