MILITARY DENIES AIRCRAFT DOWNED IN SYRIAN AIR RAID

JERUSALEM The Israeli military struck artillery positions in Syria on Tuesday after a projectile from that country’s civil war hit the Israeli-controlled part of the Golan Heights, but denied a Syrian claim that Syrian forces shot down two Israeli aircraft in the assault.

The incident was the fifth case since last week in which fighting in Syria has spilled over into Israel, and the first since a U.S.-Russian-brokered truce went into effect at sunset on Monday.

Israel has largely remained on the sidelines of the fighting, but has carried out reprisals on Syrian positions when errant fire previously landed in Israel.

Shortly after the air raid, Syria’s armed forces claimed to have shot down an Israeli warplane and an unmanned drone along the frontier between the countries.

The Israeli military quickly denied the report, saying that a pair of surface-to-air missiles were fired at its aircraft but missed. “At no point was the safety of IDF (Israel Defence Forces) aircraft compromised,” it said.