Missile fire in Damascus
Missile fire in DamascusReuters

Russia has sent a message to Israel that it would not tolerate further air strikes in the vicinity of the Damascus International Airport, the Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper reported on Friday.

According to the report, which cited Russian sources, Moscow has told Jerusalem that it intends to renovate the Damascus International Airport, and that further attacks by Israel will not be welcomed.

The Russians say that the air strikes are causing airlines from the region that want to resume operations in Syria to reconsider their decision.

This week, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu broke with his country’s long-standing policy of not publicly accepting responsibility for airstrikes in Syria, and acknowledged that Israel’s air force had attacked Iranian weapons depots at the Damascus International Airport over the past few days.

"Only in the past 36 hours the air force attacked storehouses of Iran with Iranian weapons at the Damascus international airport," Netanyahu revealed.

Before that, outgoing IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot admitted in an interview with the New York Times that the IDF carried out many attacks in Syria and Lebanon during his term in office.

Russia and Israel had in the past been coordinated regarding Israeli air strikes in Syria, but relations had cooled since the downing of a Russian reconnaissance plane over Syria in September.

Russian officials blamed Israel for the downing of the plane and later refused to accept the validity of Israel’s investigation into the incident.

In recent weeks there have been signs that the Israeli-Russian coordination is resuming. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in early January held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time since Washington's shock announcement it was withdrawing its forces from Syria.

On Thursday, Israeli military officials concluded a series of talks with their Russian counterparts aimed at improving coordination in Syria.

(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)