Israeli military shoots down Syrian warplane over Golan Heights

Israel's military said it shot down a Syrian warplane over the Golan Heights on Tuesday, in the first such incident in three decades. "It was a Russian-made Sukhoi," a military spokesman said.

Israeli military sources said the plane apparently crossed by accident into Israeli-controlled airspace over the Golan Heights - where fighting from Syria's civil war has spilled over occasionally - and was not on a mission to attack Israeli targets. The aircraft was intercepted by a U.S.-manufactured Patriot missile, the spokesman said.

Israel Radio said the warplane was apparently carrying out a mission against Syrian rebels battling the forces of President Bashar al-Assad. Israel's military said it shot down a Syrian drone over the Golan Heights on August 31.

Israel last downed a manned Syrian aircraft in 1985, when Israeli fighters on a surveillance mission over Lebanon destroyed two Syrian MiG-23s that approached them.

Syria confirmed Israel had shot down a Syrian warplane in what it described as an act of aggression, confirming the first such incident in three decades. 

Syrian state TV quoted a military source saying the downing of the plane, which coincided with US-led air strikes against Islamic State in Syria, came "in the framework of (Israel's) support for the terrorist (Islamic State) and the Nusra Front".  

Syria's Western-backed National Coalition opposition group welcomed air strikes by the United States and Gulf Arab allies on Islamic State strongholds in Syria on Tuesday, saying they would strengthen its struggle against President Bashar al-Assad.

"This will make us stronger in the fight against Assad... The campaign should continue until the Islamic State is completely eradicated from Syrian lands," Monzer Akbik, special envoy to the president of the coalition, told Reuters.