OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, November 8 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The flight over Israel of an unmanned Hizbullah spy plane has deeply embarrassed Tel Aviv’s air force, which has prided itself for decades on having total control of the region's skies.

“Breach in aerial security. Air force embarrassed. Hezbollah sees all,” read Monday's front-page headline in Israel's top-selling daily Yediot Aharonot.

“And what if next time the drone carries a bomb?” Asked the daily Maariv, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Hizbullah announced Sunday, November 7, that it had sent “a Mirsad-1 reconnaissance plane over northern Palestine (now Israel)” in retaliation for repeated violations of Lebanese airspace by Israel.

Hizbullah also warned that it could carry out more such flights.

After several hours of complete silence from the Israeli military about the incident, the army eventually confirmed the overflight of its territory.

“This morning, an Iranian UAV (unmanned air vehicle) operated by the Hizbullah terror organization infiltrated into Israel over the western Galilee,” a military spokesman said in a statement.

The army said the spy plane, launched from southern Lebanon, flew for about 15 minutes along Israel's northern Mediterranean coast until it reached the coastal resort of Nahariyah.

The drone is said to have later crashed in southern Lebanon; however, Hizbullah asserted that it returned safe to its base.

Ha'aretz daily commented that Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon, Military Intelligence Chief Major General Aharon Ze’evi Farkash and Air Force Commander Major General Eliezer Shkedi all failed at reading Hassan Nasrallah’s potential modes of action.

“In such an instance, the entire security establishment would have been up in arms about the breach in security, because the operator of the drone could easily have crashed it into a ground target - as part of a sort of targeted assassination,” the paper said.

“It is enough to imagine what would have happened if, on the ground in Nahariya, with the drone in flight, not only regular civilians were walking around, but perhaps the prime minister's motorcade was parked on the banks of the city's small river.”

It added that the incident has proved that sophisticated electronic systems cannot entirely foil clever underhanded tricks.

According to the media, the incident represents not only proof that there are holes in Israel's air defenses but also a failure by intelligence services to detect Hizbullah's preparations for such a mission.

Israeli newspapers criticized top brass for failing to read Nasrallah’s modes of action

Opposition Labor parliamentary deputy Eitan Cabel has asked the leader of the Knesset's foreign affairs and defense committee, Yuval Steinitz, to convene an emergency meeting to discuss the spy plane infiltration.

“We must know immediately how it's possible for such a rudimentary device to pass through the Israeli army's heavy air defenses, in which billions have been invested,” AFP quoted Cabel as saying.

Reserve Major General and former Air Force commander Eitan Ben Eliyahu said he cannot figure out how the drone has made it to Nahariyah.

“It should have been identified earlier,” he wrote in a commentary in Yediot Aharonot.

“I expect that (Hezbollah's) appetite will increase in the wake of this success and we need to be prepared for that -- and immediately so,” Ben Eliyahu added.

Israel considers the presence at its northern border of Hizbullah resistance fighters, backed by Iran and Syria, as a strategic threat, especially as they possess long-range missiles that can reach the northern port of Haifa.

“If we let down our guard for even a moment, we will find that this tiny bird, the drone, has turned into an eagle,” Yediot Aharonot warned in a commentary.

On November 25, 1987, a Palestinian aboard a ULM (ultralight motorized aircraft) successfully entered northern Israel from southern Lebanon, landing at night on a military base and killing six soldiers before being shot dead.