Disputes over misidentification of UAV among IOF ranks: Israeli media

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The Israeli occupation forces misidentified one of their own UAVs and attempted to shoot it down, and Israeli media reported on disputes among the occupation's ranks due to the misunderstanding regarding the drone in northern occupied Palestine in a bid to find out who is at fault.

The IOF sounded sirens in Al-Jalil, claiming that it was due to a drone "from Lebanese territory breaching the borders" and that the Iron Dome intercepted and downed the UAV.

"This is how Thursday morning was in the upper Al-Jalil," the Israeli KAN channel said. "The Iron Dome fired two Tamir interceptors toward a suspicious drone on the Lebanese borders, and the residents of the area near the borders with Lebanon were asked to go to bomb shelters."

"Later on, it was clarified that the aircraft belonged to the Israeli army. It was on a routine reconnaissance mission near the borders. It was identified as a hostile UAV by mistake, while the missiles fired toward it missed and did not succeed in intercepting it," the Israeli channel added.

KAN military affairs analyst said the unit behind the blunder was an Israeli Intelligence Corps unit of the IOF, and the issue was due to the unit not reporting to the Israeli occupation Air Force that it was sending out a drone on a reconnaissance mission near the border. It is customary that any unit that wants to fly out an aircraft informs the Air Force beforehand.

The commentator said coordination between the units of the Northern Command failed. "There was no coordination between the unit operating UAVs and the air force," he underlined, revealing that the incident was being investigated.

"An additional matter revealed through this incident is that the Iron Dome failed to intercept the drone, which once again raises the issue of the system's inability to intercept small aircraft," the Israeli expert said.

Israeli Channel 13, on the other hand, reported that there were "a few minutes of tension" on Thursday morning. "A tension that leaves us tonight with many questions. Everyone said the misidentification stemmed from a lack of coordination between the unit operating the drones and the Air Force."

"The UAV was operated by the Ground Force, and the Air Force was not informed, which led to a misidentification of the aircraft as one launched by Hezbollah that breached the borders from Lebanon, and then the Iron Dome battery located in the north was commanded to intercept it," the channel said.

"Luckily, or embarrassingly, the Iron Dome interceptors missed the UAV."

The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon had launched a UAV, Hassan, into the occupied Palestinian territories, which went on a recon mission that lasted for 40 minutes and covered 70 km in occupied Palestine. The drone returned "unharmed despite the Israeli occupation's repeated attempts to down it."

The Israeli occupation admitted its failure to down the UAV, which it said had entered occupied Palestine from Lebanon.