After the Downing

In recent posts, I've been writing about happenings in the USA, but today I turn my attention back to Israel.  If news from Israel is covered where you live, then you're probably aware that we had a little excitement here over the past weekend.  The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) were a bit busy...

Wreckage of the downed IAF F-16 burns on the ground in
Northern Israel, next to Kibbutz Harduf

In the wee hours of Saturday morning, a drone crossed over into Israeli airspace in the Jordan valley, near the town of Beit Shean.  An Israeli Air Force (IAF) attack helicopter shot it down.  And then IAF F-16 fighters launched to take out the drone control facility.  They succeeded, but one of the F-16's (they're designated Sufa, Storm, here...not Fighting Falcon) was hit by a surface to air missile and brought down.  Fortunately, the plane went down on Israeli territory, protecting any secrets that may be hidden in its electronics and other systems, and the pilot and weapons officer survived the bail-out.  One was heavily injured and his condition appeared dicey for a while, but it is now improving.  The other was lightly wounded.

In downing the F-16, the other side shot so many missiles into the air that they were raining down all over, with several landing on the Israeli side of the border - thankfully, to no effect.

It is difficult, at least for the general public, to sort out exactly whom the F-16's mission was against, and who managed to shoot the one aircraft down.  The drone, of Iranian manufacture, was based in Syria and supposedly under operational control of Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy army in Lebanon and Syria.  The particular drone design is quite striking, looking like a miniature of the US Air Force's B-2 stealth bomber.)  But whose SAM knocked the F-16 out of the air?  Hezbollah's, or the Syrian Air Defense Forces?  And if the latter, was it not really the Russians who are in control, having built up their presence in Syria in recent months in order to buttress the Assad regime in its civil war?  And what, if any, role did the Islamic State have in this activity?

The confusion is unavoidable, and symptomatic of the dilemma that Israel faces in Syria:  what happens there affects Israel profoundly, but Israel appears to have little choice but to stand on the sidelines and watch - until the hostilities spill over into Israeli territory as they periodically do, and as they did on Saturday.

My son, Eyal's tank battalion has been on watch opposite the Syrian border for the past few months, but apart from sitting in readiness, their only role has been to provide humanitarian aid for victims of the internecine violence there who get to the border looking for medical assistance.  Since Eyal is a combat medic, he has been among those rendering aid; I'm proud of him, as all Israel should be, for the work that he and his colleagues are doing in expressing the values that we hold:  that all human life is precious and all human suffering needs to be addressed.

As for the downing of the F-16, of course the Syrians, the Iranians, and various other parties in the Arab world are gloating.  This is the first IAF casualty since 1982, so it's a big deal.  If Israelis lionize their army in general, thinking them invincible, they see the air force as the elite of the elite, surpassed perhaps only by the top-tier special operations units.  That said, the air force has experienced its failures in the past:  for example, in the 1973 Yom Kippur War when the IAF took many casualties before it learned how to cope with Egyptian SAM's.  But the myth of the air force's invincibility is kept and cherished by much of the country, because Israelis know that their only real defense is technological superiority and the air force, in many people's minds, represents the apex of war fighting technology.

The IDF, for their part, is trying to put the best spin on Saturday's events.  Instead of dwelling on the loss of the F-16,  they claim to have destroyed not only the drone and its controlling facility, but also to have done serious damage to Syrian air defenses generally.  This resonates with me, having been involved in the electronic warfare game many years ago when I was young and stupid.  We wanted potential adversaries to light up their air defense radars and communications, and yes, even to fire missiles into the air because that's how we learned how to counter them.  In the US Air Force, during the Vietnam War we developed the Wild Weasels, groups of pilots flying specially-equipped fighters whose very mission was to draw the fire of enemy SAM batteries in order to defeat them.  The IAF is reputed to be fearless, and proficient, in this mission as well.  That the downed F-16 carried two airmen, more than hints to me that it was performing this mission.

After Saturday's events, several voices of the opposition in the Knesset (Israel's parliament), accused Prime Minister Netanyahu of orchestrating all this to divert the public's attention from the investigations into his possible corruption.  The report from the elite police unit that has been investigating him, had been expected to make its recommendations public early this week.  (This did, in fact happen yesterday evening, and now the state Attorney General has to decide whether to prosecute.  But I'll reserve making further comments on this until more information becomes clear.)  Fortunately, the top representatives of the main opposition parties distanced themselves from this accusation. 

As worrisome as all this is, it is important to remember that the F-16, while an important IAF workhorse, is now dated and hardly stealthy.  Thank G-d the IAF is now acquiring the latest fighter - the F-35 Lightning II - to counter the existing and emerging threats of this century.

Never a dull moment, eh?