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Israeli paper laments 'drones dropping like flies in enemy territory'

An Israeli Heron military drone flies over the southern Israeli city of Ashdod on November 13, 2019. (Photo by AFP)

The Jerusalem Post has lamented that "Israeli military drones are dropping like flies" in the Lebanese and Palestinian territories, as resistance forces gain momentum in their defense against the regime intrusions. 

Three military drones belonging to the Israeli regime were downed on three consecutive days this week, setting a new record for Palestinian and Lebanese resistance forces who took responsibility for the incidents.

Palestinian resistance fighters shot down an Israeli quadcopter on Sunday over Beit Hanoun Crossing on Gaza’s northern border with the occupied territories. The drone was shot down while taking images of the area, according to the Arabic-language Palestine Today news agency.

On Monday, the Lebanese Hezbollah resistance movement downed an Israeli unmanned aerial vehicle as it crossed into Lebanon near the border village of Blida. In a statement after the incident, Hezbollah said it was in the control of the drone.

The next day, Palestinian fighters shot down another Israeli drone east of the city of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip and managed to take control of it.

The Israeli military initially offered its own narrative which included playing down the resistance forces’ power, even though it acknowledged the incidents.

On Sunday, an Israeli military spokesperson said an army unit operating near Gaza lost one of its drones which was on a mission.

Regarding the Monday incident in Lebanon, the Israeli military said the drone had fallen in Lebanese territory during an operation.

The drone “fell in the course of military activity,” an Israeli military spokesperson was quoted as saying.

“There is no concern of sensitive information being leaked,” the spokesperson claimed, but did not specify whether the drone crashed or was downed.

On the last but not least incident, the Israeli military said one of its drones had “crashed” in Gaza during operational activity on Tuesday but again claimed that there was “no danger of information leak.”

Journalist and political commentator Richard Silverstein told Press TV that the drones are an “important intelligence tool” for Israel to spy on other countries.

“I think that Israel is really disregarding the territorial sovereignty in Lebanon, in Gaza and in other places as well such as Syria and Iraq,” Silverstein said.

The resistance forces’ show of force, nevertheless, did not end on Tuesday. Lebanon’s armed forces fired a missile at a much larger and more advanced Israeli drone on Wednesday, as the aircraft violated the Lebanese airspace.

The Israeli military claimed in a statement that the drone was not damaged in the attack and continued its mission. “Anti-aircraft missiles were just fired toward an IDF remote-piloted aerial vehicle during routine activity over Lebanese territory,” it said.

Israeli drones regularly conduct espionage missions against the besieged Gaza Strip and Lebanon. Although the regime has claimed that there is no danger of information leak after the incidents, security experts say otherwise.

“Once your drone is in the wrong hands, there is definitely useful information that can be gleaned from it,” Asaf Lebovitz, vice president of sales at Skylock, a company that designs anti-drone technology, told the Jerusalem Post

“You have forensic data: You can tell where the drone had been flying, what its course was, where it took off from inside Israel, where it was sent to gather information. It enables you to find out what the other side was interested in.”

On the Israeli regime’s violation of the territorial integrity of other countries, Silverstein said Israel does not care at all about honoring international protocols and international law.

“It just at will violates any country’s territory as long as it feels it’s in its interests to do so, and I think it has been violating Lebanese territory for decades,” he said. “It tries to watch what people do in those places.”


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