Two civilian planes in Lebanese airspace “narrowly avoide catastrophe” from Israeli warplanes, caretaker Transport Minister Youssef Fenianos said Wednesday.
Fenianos said the warplanes were flying in Lebanese airspace “during [Israel’s] assault on southern Damascus” Tuesday evening, in a phone call to Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri.
According to a statement from the minister’s office carried by the state-run National News Agency, Fenianos and Hariri agreed “to make decisions” protecting the country, and for Lebanon to lodge an “urgent complaint” to the U.N. Security Council against Israel.
Syria said via state media Tuesday that its air defenses shot down Israeli missiles near Damascus, while Israel said it was protecting itself from anti-aircraft fire.
An airport source told The Daily Star that no planes belonging to Middle East Airlines - Lebanon’s national carrier - were flying at the time of the incident.
Moscow's defense ministry earlier Wednesday said Israeli strikes had endangered two passenger planes.
"The provocative actions of the Israeli air force ... directly threatened two airliners," ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in a statement.
He said the attack occurred over Lebanese territory and came as "two airliners, not from Russia, were preparing to land at the airports of Beirut and Damascus."
He said restrictions were imposed on the use of Syrian government forces' air defense systems "to prevent a tragedy." One of the planes was redirected to a Russian airbase within Syria.
The Russian defense ministry also said three Syrian military personnel were injured in a strike that saw Israeli warplanes drop 16 bombs.
Of these, 14 were destroyed by Syrian defense systems, according to the ministry.
With the airstrikes, Moscow considered that Israel had violated Syria's sovereignty.
"We are very concerned by the attacks and how they were made. This is a gross violation of the sovereignty of Syria," the Russian ministry of foreign affairs said in a statement.
If Israel is confirmed to have instigated the strikes, it would be the first attack since U.S. President Donald Trump announced last week the withdrawal of American troops from Syria.
Experts say Israel is to be greatly affected by a U.S. pull out, as it would leave the area open to Iran and its partners to develop their military capacity.
Moscow is an ally of Damascus and its intervention in Syria's civil war in 2015 was seen as key to propping up President Bashar Assad's regime.
Agencies
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