Russian Army Disrupts GPS Systems In Israeli Airspace
By Donald Standeford, Correspondent - Follow -
Date Published: January 31, 2022 07:20PM UTC
Last Modified: January 31, 2022 07:20PM UTC
ISRAEL - The Russian army is reportedly disrupting GPS signals with electromagnetic waves in Latakia as well as Ben Gurion Airport, the main airport in Israel according to KAAN news. (This report is based on a translation of the KAAN article originally published in Hebrew).
KAAN news says that in the last few weeks airline pilots have been dealing with a phenomenon that has reoccurred after a '3 year hiatus' where severe GPS disruptions are occurring in aircraft that are preparing to land at the Ben Gurion airport.
The disruptions are reportedly due to the effects of powerful and advanced defense systems of the Russian army that disrupt the electromagnetic waves in the eastern Mediterranean and also disrupts aircraft landing in Israeli airspace.
Israel has demanded that Russia halt the disruptions and said that the 'defensive systems' are harming it, but the Russians have refused saying that the systems are a defensive action to protect their soldiers.
Israel reportedly says that they are working on neutralizing the disruption caused by the Russian systems. Some Israelis say that they believe Russia is trying to show who is the 'landlord' of Syria.
One of the pilots of an Israeli airline stated "These events hit us quite hard in early 2019, so it more or less worked out one way or another. In the last three or four weeks we are starting to re-experience it in the Ben Gurion Airport area. There are speculations that this is "In the kind of action of the Russians, who are trying to block the possibility of harming them by disrupting GPS systems".
Two months ago a commander of the IDF Spectrum Warfare Center commented on the GPS disruptions at the Ben Gurion Airport saying "What we encountered was a spectral disturbance from the east and it took us a long time to figure out what it was".
The commander said that the disruptions are not aimed at harming Israelis saying, "if they try to prevent a plane from landing in one place, it prevents the plane from landing in another place".
KAAN news says that in recent weeks the Russian military has stepped up its operations in Syria alongside Assad's army and is reportedly using electronic warfare systems designed to protect soldiers from possible attack using satellite-based weapon systems.
One pilot says there are two types of disruptions to GPS readings, "Jamming which is to actually block the signal. The second type of disruption is called 'popping', which means that someone is transmitting a signal that is interfering with the GPS position. In this situation you can receive all kinds of alerts".
The airlines sent out instructions to the pilots in order to deal with the new phenomenon which included turning off their devices in the cockpit in the event of disruptions.
An official update has not been published by the state of Israel according to KAAN news. The pilot stated that "It could be that it's to some extent a kind of burial in the sand because we know it exists and the reports of these incidents come out in the form of incident reports, that is to say they reach the chief investigator and RTA. "An institutional alert from the state authorities did not go out".
An IDF spokesman stated that "the IDF controls the spectral dimension, protects and acts against threats as part of a multidimensional defense of the State of Israel".
