According to Russian Defense Ministry spokesperson Igor Konashenkov, the Russian transport plane was shot down Monday night, local time, as Israel F-16‘s attempted to use it as cover while carrying out a bombing mission against targets in the Latakia region of western Syria near the Meditarranean coast.

„By using the Russian plane as cover the Israeli air pilots made it vulnerable to Syrian air defense fire. As a result, the Ilyushin-20, its reflective surface being far greater than that of the F-16, was downed by a missile launched with the S-200 system,“ Konashenkov told reporters.