According to various media, a Russian air defense unit either fired or locked S-300PMU anti-aircraft missiles at Israeli F-16C/I jets during an air attack on targets located in northwestern Syria last week, Israel’s Channel 13 News said on May 16.
“For the first time since the beginning of the attacks on Syria, a Russian air defense system fired S-300 missiles toward an (Israeli) air force aircraft”, Israeli Channel 13 quoted military affairs commentator Alon Ben David as saying. The Russian Ministry of Defense had revealed Saturday, May 14, that six Israeli F-16s fired 22 missiles toward an underground Syrian scientific research center in Masyaf and the Baniyas port. The S-300PMUs downed 16 missiles out of the 22, Almayadeen reported.
Russian Reconciliation Center for Syria deputy chief Oleg Zhuravlyov announced that six Israeli F-16s on May 13 between 20:25 and 20:32 attacked sites belonging to the Syrian scientific research center in Masyaf and Baniyas without entering the Syrian airspace. “The Air Defense Forces in the Syrian Arab Republic were able to (shoot) down 16 missiles and a UAV Israel used in the attack”, Zhuravlyov added. The Israeli attack, the Russian official said, killed five Syrian soldiers (the operating crew of a Pantsir-S1 air defense system supplied by Russia) and two civilians, with two Syrian soldiers sustaining injuries. Satellite imagery, provided by the company ImageSat International (ISI), shows that the Masyaf site, a priori under the Syrian Center for Scientific Studies and Research (SSRC), has been destroyed