In light of the recent IAF activities in Syria, Israel has repositioned two Iron Dome anti-missile batteries to the country’s north.

One has been placed near Tzfat (Sefad), the second near Haifa.

Sources in Israel have confirmed that the country’s air force launched a strike in Syria against what are believed to be stockpiles of weapons headed for the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon, the Voice of America reported.

There has been no official statement on the attack from the Israeli government.

It was the second time in four months that Israel had carried out an attack in foreign territory aimed at disrupting the pipeline of weapons from Iran to Hezbollah. According to the NY Times, the missiles, known as Fateh-110s, had been sent to Syria by Iran and were being stored at an airport in Damascus when they were struck in the attack, according to an American official.

Syrians with knowledge of security and military matters confirmed the strike to the NY Times, saying it took place overnight Thursday, and saying that Iran had sent arms and rockets to Damascus International Airport intending to for them to be shipped to Hezbollah.

CNN quoted unnamed U.S. officials as saying Israel most likely conducted the strike “in the Thursday-Friday time frame” and its jets did not enter Syrian air space.

The attack took place after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet approved it in a secret meeting on Thursday night, an Israeli anonymous source said.

The Daily Star of Lebanon noted that the Israeli air force has so-called “standoff” bombs that coast dozens of miles across ground to their targets once fired. That could, in theory, allow Israel to attack Syria from its own turf or from adjacent Lebanon.

Lebanese authorities reported unusually intensive Israeli air force activity over their territory on Thursday and Friday.

A Lebanese security source said his initial impression was that Israeli flights were monitoring potential arms shipments between Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“We believe that it is linked to Israel’s concerns over the transfer of weapons, particularly chemical weapons, from Syria to its allies Lebanon,” said the official, who asked not to be named.

Syrian Fateh 110 series tactical ballistic missile

The Fateh-110 is a single-stage solid-propellant, surface-to-surface missile which, as of 2012, is reported to have at least a 200-mile range. It is produced by Iran. That’s well beyond the distance from southern Lebanon, Hezbollah’s stronghold, and Tel Aviv. It carries a 1500 lbs. warhead.

Qassim Saadedine, a commander and spokesman for the rebel Free Syrian Army, said: “Our information indicates there was an Israeli strike on a convoy that was transferring missiles to Hezbollah. We have still not confirmed the location.”

According to the Daily Star of Lebanon, Rebel units were in disagreement about what type of weapons were in the convoy. A rebel from an information-gathering unit in Damascus that calls itself “The Syrian Islamic Masts Intelligence” said the convoy carried anti-aircraft missiles.

The rebel, who asked not to be named, said: “There were three strikes by Israeli F-16 jets that damaged a convoy carrying anti-aircraft missiles heading to the Shiite Lebanese party [Hezbollah] along the Damascus-Beirut military road.

“One strike hit a site near the [Syrian] Fourth Armoured Division in al-Saboura but we have been unable to determine what is in that location”.

Saadedine said he did not think the weapons were anti-aircraft. “We have nothing confirmed yet but we are assuming that it is some type of long-range missile that would be capable of carrying chemical materials,” he said.

According to reports from the main Syrian opposition group, the Free Syria Army, the Israeli Air Force bombed a chemical weapons site in Syria, near Damascus, on Saturday, April 27.

The Israeli jets flew over Syrian President Basher Assad’s palace, as reported elsewhere, and then allegedly struck a chemical weapons compound nearby.

Although there were reports that Syrian defense forces fired at the IAF, the Israeli jets left Syrian airspace unharmed.

Last week the Israeli military published intelligence findings that President Bashar Assad’s forces had used chemical weapons repeatedly in recent months. The U.S. was initially reluctant to embrace those findings, and even after admitting that Syria had used chemical weapons “on a small scale,” has remained reluctant to take immediate action.

A second report emanating from Syria potentially supported the claims that Israel struck the chemical weapons site, although this report did not mention Israel’s purported role.

This report from Lebanon’s Daily Star discussed heavy fighting near the “Scientific Studies and Research Centre on the foothills of Qasioun Mountain in the northern Barzeh district,” which, according to American defense experts, is a way Syrians are likely to refer to the chemical weapons site.

A retired U.S. naval intelligence officer, J.E. Dyer, believes it is possible Israel engaged in the strike.  For one thing, as noted in the Daily Star report – Assad’s forces are engaged in an all-out effort to retake the area around the SSRC compound from the rebels. Given the fighting in the area, the danger increases that the chemical weapons inventory would fall into rebel hands, “including Islamist jihadists, including Hezbollah, Hamas and al Qaeda.”

But Dyer had several caveats.  First, she said, taking down the SSRC would be a big job, likely requiring sequential strikes. “There’s a lot of industrial square footage to thump; the IAF would want to put more than a couple of strike fighters over the target.”

And Dyer doesn’t imagine Israel would take the risk of entering Syrian airspace and fail to complete a specific job.  “Either you go in to take it out for the duration of the civil war, or you don’t hit it at all,” is how she put it.

Therefore it is possible the IAF attacked something else near the SSRC on Saturday. Perhaps there was a discrete reachable target that presented itself and Israel took the opportunity to reduce the dangerous materials so close to her own border.  This could have been an attack like the one in late January when Israel struck a truck convoy near Damascus which was moving sophisticated  Russian-made anti-aircraft missiles for Hezbollah in Lebanon.

IAF attacked targets in Gaza, after rockets from Gaza hit Israel on Saturday night.

The IAF says they hit a weapons cache in southern Gaza.

In response to the Gazan terror attack, Israel also completely closed the Kerem Shalom crossing. The Erez crossing has also been closed to all transfers and traffic except for humanitarian purposes.

Following 3 rocket launches from Gaza on Tuesday evening, the Israel Air Force struck back at targets within Gaza.

This was the first time that Israel has responded with an air assault to the Gaza rocket launches since the Pillars of Defense cease fire. No one was reported injured in the IAF strike.

The Gazan rockets hit in the Eshkol region.

There was also a mortar launched earlier in the day that fell short and landed within the Gaza Strip.

The IDF Spokesperson said,

“The IDF will not accept any attempt to attack Israeli citizens or IDF soldiers, and the IDF has no intention of allowing the return to the situation as it was before Operation Pillars of Defense.
The IDF views the attacks on Israel as very serious, and holds Hamas responsible.”

Earlier in the day police also found the remains of the Palestinian rocket that targeted Israel during President Obama’s visit on March 21.

The Gaza rocket had hit a kindergarten in Sderot. The school was closed and empty at the time for the extended Passover vacation.

At 1:00 AM, Tuesday morning, contact was lost with an Israeli Air Force Cobra helicopter on a training exercise, near Kibbutz Revadim, according to the IDF spokesperson.

At 5:15 AM the bodies of the two crew members, and parts of the helicopter were found. The two were veteran reservists, and the flight was a routine training exercise.

The helicopter was on its way back to the Palmahim Air Force base when it crashed.

The last time an IAF Cobra helicopter crashed was in June 2008.

Kibbutz Revadim is along the southern coastal plain, east of Ashdod, and north of Kiryat Gat.

The Israel Air Force Sunday night bombed a Hizbullah spy communications center in Tyre, on the coast of Lebanon, according to a Lebanese newspaper that supports anti-Hizbullah parties.

Hizbullah denied the report even though its own televise network originally said Israel hit Tyre, only to later change its version to claim that the explosion was that of a “stun gun.”

The Al-Mustaqbal newspaper reported that Hizbullah quickly cordoned off the area after the apparent Israeli strike, which came less than a week after the bombing of Russian-made SA-17 anti-aircraft missiles on their way from Damascus to Hizbullah.

It quoted others sources as stating that Hizbullah destroyed the listening post that allegedly had been planted by Israeli agents.

Nahranet reported, “Israeli aircraft did not leave the Lebanese airspace over the south all through the day” on Sunday.

The IAF staged several mock raids over southern Lebanon the past several days despite condemnation from the Arab world and Russia for the bombing of the anti-aircraft missiles. Syria and Iran threatened to retaliate against Israel.

Hizbullah could severely cripple Israel’s ability to spot terrorist activity if the terrorist organization were to obtain the sophisticated Russian-made missiles.

Lebanese Foreign Minister Adnan Mansour demanded on Sunday that the world retaliate for the bombing of the anti-aircraft missiles by placing “a tough boycott on the economic, political and diplomatic levels.”

“Israeli jets continue to invade Lebanon’s airspace every day. We must stand up against the Israeli attacks but not just with calls, statements and condemnation,” he said.

Russia is expressing concern about an air strike by Israeli warplanes inside Syria, which targeted either a “scientific” facility outside the Syrian capital, Damascus, on Wednesday, (according to Syrian reports), or a convoy of anti-aircraft missiles on its way to a Hezbollah base (according to Western reports). This development comes amid rising international fear that President Bashar Assad is about to lose control of his nation’s stockpiles of chemical and advanced weapons.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has stated that such action, if confirmed, amounts to “unprovoked attacks” against a sovereign nation, in violation of the United Nations charter.

If the reports of “unprovoked strikes” hitting a sovereign country’s territory are confirmed, this would constitute a violation of fundamental United Nations principles, the Foreign Ministry said.

Such attacks are ”unacceptable, no matter where their motivations lie,” the Foreign Ministry added.

There are fears that the Israeli strike could draw others into the Syrian conflict. Iran, Syria’s close ally, said this week that any foreign attack against Syria would be regarded as an attack on Iran.

Differing accounts of the Wednesday air strike have emerged, with Syrian authorities saying Israeli jets fired on a military research facility near Damascus, killing two people.

The conflicting reports could not be resolved or independently confirmed by early Thursday and it remains unclear whether one or two separate strikes occurred. Israel refused to comment on Wednesday.

A statement from Syria’s military command says the strike followed months of “botched attempts” to seize control of the facility by “terrorist groups” – the government’s label for rebels trying to topple President al-Assad. The Israeli pilots are said to have flown into Syria at low altitude, to evade detection.

A Western official who spoke on condition of anonymity told the LA Times that the air strike hit a truck convoy believed to be carrying antiaircraft weapons for Hezbollah terrorists across the border, in Lebanon. The shipment was thought to have included Russian SA-17 missiles, the official said.

These weapons in the hands of the Islamic group could weaken Israel’s regional military power and curb its ability to launch air strikes in Lebanon.

In addition to chemical weapons, Israeli officials have been particularly worried about Syria’s stockpile of SA-17 antiaircraft missiles.

“The initial speculation was about chemical weapons, but Israel is deeply concerned about Hezbollah acquiring this kind of advanced antiaircraft missile,” said Jonathan Spyer, a senior research fellow at the Center for Global Research in International Affairs in Herzliya, Israel. “It would transform Hezbollah’s game and potentially end Israel’s air superiority over Lebanon. This is entirely about Hezbollah, not about Syria.”

In March 2012, Haaretz reported that Syria had supplied Hezbollah with advanced Russian-made anti-aircraft missile systems and was training operators how to use them,.

In 2007, Israel carried out an air raid on Syria’s nuclear reactor site.

The Russia Foreign Ministry also called on for peaceful dialogue without foreign influence in Syria, where over 60,000 have died according to the UN in almost two years of civil war.

In recent weeks, Israeli officials have warned that they will not tolerate any transfer of Syrian weapons to militants such as Hezbollah.

The former head of the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, Amnon Sofin, says Israel’s greatest concern is that Syrian chemical weapons could come under control of Hezbollah terrorists dug in along the Lebanese border.

Sofin told reporters Wednesday that Hezbollah already has rockets and launchers and there are fears that such missiles could be fitted to carry chemical warheads.