Syria declares to respond to Israeli attack south of the country

DAMASCUS (Reuters) - Syrian air defenses confronted an Israeli air strike in the south of the country on Sunday and dropped several rockets over the area, the official Syrian news agency quoted a military source as saying.

"Our air defenses have responded with high efficiency to an Israeli aerial attack targeting the southern region and prevented it from achieving any of its objectives," the source said.

The Russian military control center said the Israeli offensive, which the Syrian army had confronted, targeted an airport in southeastern Damascus.

While an Israeli army spokeswoman declined to comment, an army statement said his iron dome system had dropped a rocket fired at the northern part of the Golan Heights on the Syrian border.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu admitted an Israeli attack last week on what he called a store of Iranian weapons in Syria, with Tehran providing vital support to Damascus.

He told his cabinet that he had carried out "hundreds" of attacks over the past years during the Syrian war to curtail Iran and its ally Hezbollah.

Israel has abandoned its usual silence over attacks on Iranian targets near its border this month, a sign of confidence in a campaign launched amid occasional tensions with Russia's main ally.

Since the beginning of the conflict in Syria in 2011, Israel has repeatedly bombed military targets for Syrian and Lebanese forces in Syria.