Syria claims finding Israeli ‘spy devices’

DAMASCUS

This photo shows rocks used to ‘camouflage’ surveillance cameras found on the Syrian coast. AFP Photo

This photo shows rocks used to ‘camouflage’ surveillance cameras found on the Syrian coast.
Syria said today it had uncovered an Israeli spy camera monitoring a “sensitive site” on its Mediterranean coast.

State television showed pictures of what it said was a camera, six large batteries and transmission gear along with fake rocks used to camouflage the equipment. It quoted an official source as saying the equipment was found in the last few days at a coastal location not specified, and that the discovery highlighted the role Israel had played in the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad. It said the camera had relayed pictures in real time and had been used in the service of both Israel and “armed terrorist groups.”

‘Israel won’t be drag into war’

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor would not comment on the report. “We will not be dragged into the Syrian civil war. Not on the verbal or propaganda battlefield, nor on the real one,” he said. The equipment closely resembled items seized in Lebanon in recent years that Lebanese authorities said were also used by Israel to monitor movements inside Lebanon.

Meanwhile, Syrian rebels held hostage 21 U.N. peacekeepers patrolling the sensitive armistice line with Israel for a second day yesterday, defying a chorus of international condemnation and calls for their release.

Diplomats scrambled to secure the release of the 21 Filipinos, as concern mounted that their seizure might prompt more governments to withdraw their contingents from the already depleted U.N. mission. Israeli officials warned that any further reduction in the strength of the U.N. Disengagement Observer Force risked creating a security vacuum in the no-man’s land between the two sides on the strategic Golan Heights.

Compiled from Reuters and AFP stories by the Daily News staff.