Special to WorldTribune.com

AMMAN — For the first time, Jordan has launched air strikes on
neighboring Syria.

The Jordanian military said fighter-jets attacked armored vehicles in
southern Syria as they sought to cross the border into the Hashemite
kingdom.

A military statement said the camouflaged vehicles, identified as Land Rovers, were destroyed.

Later, diplomatic sources said the vehicles, several of them pickups with mounted machine guns, were driven by U.S.-trained Sunni rebels who fled the Syrian Army and rival Islamist militias.

The sources said the vehicles were suspected of containing weapons and drugs. They said most of the occupants of the vehicles fled when they saw the Jordanian aircraft.

“The Royal Jordanian Air Force on Wednesday destroyed a number of armored vehicles when they attempted to enter into the kingdom from Syria,” the military said.

The statement marked the first time Jordan reported an air strike on Syria amid its three-year civil war.

The military said fighter-jets fired “warning shots” toward the vehicles as they traveled through rough terrain to reach the 370-kilometer southern border.

“The vehicles did not obey,” the statement said. “Consequently, the
vehicles were targeted and destroyed by these fighter-jets.”

In March, the sources said, the CIA sent about 500 rebels from Jordan
into Syria. They said the rebels came under attack hours after their entry,
and many of them fled to the Golan Heights near Israel.

The Jordanian fighter-jets were not identified. But the air force has
been operating around 60 U.S.-origin F-16 multi-role fighters, manufactured
by Lockheed Martin.

The Syrian military asserted that it was not involved in the attack.
“What was targeted by the Jordanian Air Force does not belong to the
Syrian army,” a Syrian military source told the official Syrian Arab News
Agency.

“Jordan has cooperated with the United States, but has refrained from
any declaration or open support of the rebels,” a source said.

  Jordan air strike at Syrian border said to hit convoy of U.S.-trained rebels, Royal Jordanian Air Force, Sunni rebels