FOXNews.com: AERIAL STRIKE:Official: Israeli Warplanes Hit Syrian Weapons Facility

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AERIAL STRIKE:Official: Israeli Warplanes Hit Syrian Weapons Facility May 4th 2013, 03:15 A Syrian weapons facility was struck overnight Thursday into Friday by Israeli warplanes, a U.S. official told Fox News. A source told Fox News that it is not clear whether the warplanes crossed into Syrian airspace or whether the missiles were fired from across the border.  It did not appear that a chemical weapons site was targeted, officials told The Associated Press, and one official said the strike appeared to have hit a warehouse. U.S. forces were not involved. When Israeli planes fired on a weapons convoy inside Syria in January, they remained outside Syrian airspace. The convoy was believed to be carrying Russian SA-17 anti-aircraft missiles. "Israel is determined to prevent the transfer of chemical weapons or other game-changing weaponry by the Syrian regime to terrorists, specially to Hizbullah in Lebanon," an official from the Israeli Embassy in Washington told Fox News. Israel has targeted weapons in the past that it believes are being delivered to the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah. Earlier this week, Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said his group would assist Syrian President Bashar Assad if needed in the effort to put down a 2-year-old uprising. In 2007, Israeli jets bombed a suspected nuclear reactor site along the Euphrates River in northeastern Syria, an attack that embarrassed and jolted the Assad regime and led to a buildup of the Syrian air defense system. Russia provided the hardware for the defense systems upgrade and continues to be a reliable supplier of military equipment to the Assad regime. Word of the new strike, first reported by CNN, came hours before President Barack Obama told reporters at a news conference in Costa Rica on Friday that he didn't foresee a scenario in which the U.S. would send troops to Syria. More than 70,000 peoples have died and hundreds of thousands have fled the country as the Assad regime has battled rebels. The Israeli strike also follows days of renewed concerns that Syria might be using chemical weapons against opposition forces. Obama has characterized evidence of the use of chemical weapons as a "game-changer" that would have "enormous consequences." While the U.S. has been providing nonlethal aide to opposition forces in Syria, even stepping up that form of support in recent days, the Obama administration has resisted calls from some American lawmakers to arm the rebels or to work to establish a no-fly zone to aid the insurgency. On Thursday, however, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said the administration is rethinking its opposition to providing arms to the rebels. He said it was one of several options as the U.S. consults with allies about steps to be taken to drive Assad from power. Officials in the administration who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss strategy said earlier this week that arming the opposition forces was seen as more likely than any other military option. Obama followed Hagel's comments by saying options will continue to be evaluated, though he did not cite providing arms specifically. Concerns that U.S. weapons could end up in the hands of al-Qaida-linked groups helping the Syrian opposition or other extremists, including Hezbollah, have stood in the way of that change in strategy. "We want to make sure that we look before we leap and that what we're doing is actually helpful to the situation as opposed to making it more deadly or more complex," Obama said Thursday at a news conference in Mexico. Pentagon spokesman George Little declined to comment on the report. Fox News' Jennifer Griffin, James Rosen and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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