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Ammon News - Israel warned the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday that it would pay a “high price” for helping militant groups bent on attacking the Jewish state.

“We see the Assad regime as responsible for what is happening under its authority, and if it continues to cooperate with terror elements who seek to harm Israel, we will make it pay a high price,” Israel Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said.

His statements came after the Israeli air force had bombed Syrian military targets on Wednesday.

“We will not put up with any breach of our sovereignty or attack on our soldiers or citizens, and we will react with determination and force against anyone acting against us, at any time and any place, as we have done overnight,” Yaalon said in a statement.

“Whoever tries to harm us takes his fate in his hands.”

Syria's forces are supported in their battle against rebels seeking to topple Assad by fighters from Hezbollah, a powerful Lebanese Shiite movement which battled Israel to a bloody stalemate in a 2006 war.

Attacks on Syrian posts

The Israeli air raids on Wednesday took place 12 hours after four soldiers who were patrolling the Israeli side of the Golan Heights frontier were wounded by a roadside bomb.

The Israeli army attacked several Syrian military sites on Wednesday in retaliation.

Israeli military spokesman, Lieutenant-Colonel Peter Lerner, said the attacks targeted Syrian military headquarters, a training facility and artillery batteries, according to statements carried by Reuters.

The Syrian fighting sometimes spills over into Israeli border communities, prompting occasional retaliations from Israel.

Israel captured the Golan from Syria in the 1967 war and annexed it in a move not recognized abroad.

Tuesday's wounding of the soldiers as they patrolled the separation line on the strategic plateau marked Israel's worst casualties there since an insurgency erupted in Syria more than three years ago.

*Agencies