WarSclerotic

A senior Iranian lawmaker on Sunday condemned the Kremlin for allegedly preventing the Syrian army from using its Russian-supplied S-300 surface-to-air missile systems against Israeli warplanes earlier this month.

Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, the chairman of the Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said the Russians had made sure to disable the advanced S-300 systems during an Israeli airstrike.

“There appears to be a strange type of correlation between the Zionist regime’s airstrikes and the Russian air defenses not working,” he said.

Falahatpisheh also said Israeli reports of destroyed Iranian infrastructure in Syria were completely false.

“The Zionists aspire to undermine the stability of the regime in Syria, with the aim of causing Iran to respond and to push into a corner,” Falahatpisheh remarked, adding that he had visited the sites bombed by Israel.

Last week, Iran’s state-run news network reported that Russian air defenses had failed to function during an Israeli airstrike on Damascus. Russia and Iran have clashed in the past over Moscow’s refusal to transfer more advanced models of the S-300 to Syria.

On Friday, Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov denied Moscow had formed an alliance with Iran in Syria and said the Kremlin was deeply committed to Israel’s security.