JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel will not intervene in the Syrian civil war if Israel is not being targeted, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.

Netanyahu also told his Cabinet at the weekly meeting Sunday that the situation in Syria shows Israel can not depend on others for  its security.

Netanyahu said he spoke over the weekend with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who late last week offered to replace 280 withdrawn United Nations peacekeepers from Austria with Russian troops. The Austrian peacekeepers were recalled after intensified fighting in the Golan Heights on the border with Israel.

“Over the weekend, I spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin,” Netanyahu told the Cabinet on Sunday. “We discussed issues related to Syria, where the situation is becoming daily more complex. Only last week, we saw battles close to out border on the Golan Heights. Israel is not intervening in the Syrian civil war, as long as fire is not being directed at us.”

“The crumbling of the U.N. force on the Golan Heights underscores the fact that Israel cannot depend on international forces for its security. They can be part of the arrangements. They cannot be the basic foundation of Israel’s security,” Netanyahu said.

The United Nations on Friday turned down Russia’s offer, saying that the cease-fire agreement between Israel and Syria bars permanent members of the U.N. Security Council from serving on the 1,000-strong U.N. force observing a four-decade-old ceasefire between Syria and Israel,

Israel complained to the peacekeeping force on June 6 about Syrian tanks being used and then left in the demilitarized zone between Israel and Syria as part of the fighting in Syria’s two-year civil war.

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