Air Force Commander admits failure in Yavne UAV attack 

The Commander of the Israeli Air Force (IAF), Maj. Gen. Tomer Bar, held an operational debriefing yesterday (Monday) on the subject of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) attack on a building in the city of Yavne, which concluded that the Air Force failed in the incident and did not provide protection and warning to the citizens of Israel.

It revealed that the hostile aircraft, which was launched from Yemen, was identified as a suspicious target near other non-hostile aircraft. A combat helicopter and defense systems were prepared to intercept the vehicle. The vehicle was not intercepted due to concerns that it was a civilian aircraft and due to the lack of continuous surveillance.

It was also determined that the failure to activate the alerts was an error, which resulted from the fact that the aircraft was not classified as a hostile aircraft.

The Major General accepted the recommendations of the investigation and concluded that the Air Force failed in the incident and did not provide protection and warning to the citizens of Israel. He also ruled that this was a complex incident in a civilian space, and that the warning policy should be expansive even when there is no unequivocal classification of an aircraft as a hostile vehicle.