The Syrian government said on Tuesday that Israel would face "more surprises" in future attacks on Syria's territory, after Syrian air defences shot down an Israeli F-16 jet.

Syrian anti-aircraft fire downed the F-16 as it returned from a bombing raid on Iran-backed positions in Syria early on Saturday. Both Iran and Russia are supporting President Bashar al-Assad in Syria's near seven-year civil war.

"Have full confidence the aggressor will be greatly surprised because it thought this war - this war of attrition Syria has been exposed to for years - had made it incapable of confronting attacks," assistant foreign minister Ayman Sussan said.

Washington could soon receive the "Ottoman slap," Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned, while also stating that all members of NATO are equal with the US.

While speaking to the ruling Justice and Development (AK) party in Ankara on Tuesday, Erdogan referenced a recent remark by Lt. Gen. Paul E. Funk, the top US commander in the US-led coalition against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), who said that Turkey would face a sharp response if it struck Manbij, Syria.

"Those who say they will give a sharp response if hit, have clearly never got the Ottoman slap in their lives," Erdogan said, referring to a half-legendary Turkish martial move that involves a potent open-palm hit, resulting in a one-hit knockout or even skull fractures and death.

Russia could provide platform for a potential meeting between Mahmoud Abbas and Benjamin Netanyahu, the Palestinian foreign minister said, voicing Palestine's readiness to sit down for direct talks with Israel.

"Absolutely, [we are ready for direct talks] through a third party, of course," Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki said Tuesday, as quoted by RIA. "We don't think a 15-minute meeting in Jerusalem would help us," the minister went on, noting that "coming to Sochi or Moscow would be a good decision, if [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu is willing to."

"The flight is no longer than three hours, and [Netanyahu] would enjoy hospitality of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and the Russian people," al-Maliki said, calling on the Israeli side to consider the option, according to RIA.

Palestinian activist Ahed Tamimi, 16, has gone on trial before an Israeli military court. Israel has faced criticism for prosecuting the teen who has become a powerful symbol of the Palestinian resistance.

Only family members were allowed to remain in the courtroom at Ofer military base, and diplomats were also asked to leave. After the prosecution read out the indictment, Tamimi's trial was adjourned until March 11.

Ahead of Ahed Tamimi's trial, RT America visited her home village of Nabi Saleh to speak to her family. It also spoke to Luisa Morgantini, the former vice president of the European Parliament (EP).

Morgantini said the "injustice of the Israeli occupation is so great that one cannot remain silent."

The mounting US debt is likely to grow by another $10 trillion in the next decade, according to estimates contained in the recent budget proposal.

According to the White House Office of Management and Budget, the national debt will hit $29.9 trillion by 2028. The deficit will be equal to 101 percent of America's GDP, the Watchdog Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget forecasts. The country's current debt stands at a record $20.6 trillion - its highest level since shortly after World War II.

If current laws stand, widening budget deficits will increase that debt sharply over the next 30 years, with the deficit reaching 150 percent of GDP in 2047, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) predicted last year.

"Mister Baudet, we have only just begun," cried Dutch D66 leader Alexander Pechtold at the end of an election debate in Amsterdam last week. Pechtold had already lashed out at Thierry Baudet several times, who had to hold his ground in a barrage of malicious and mendacious accusations by, among others, Lodewijk ("Be a man"), Asscher and Jesse ("moral elevated self"), and Klaver. The same Asscher who sat in Mark Rutte's lap for four years without keeping a straight face, he was that servile. Jesse Klaver, who did not manage to fulfill the role of the Messiah and who left the formation talks on his bench-bike in a cowardly manner.

A cleverly made video compilation was published on YouTube on 10 February, in which images of demonising politicians against Fortuyn are interspersed with images of demonising politicians against Baudet. The recording is frightening and nauseating. [Below is a transcript of what was said]

US Secretary of Defense James Mattis has brushed off speculation that North Korea is using the 2018 Winter Olympics to "drive a wedge" between the US and South Korea, its traditional ally in the Asia-Pacific.

High-level talks between Pyongyang and Seoul, the first in decades, took place on the sidelines of the PyeongChang Olympics. DPRK leader Kim Jong-un's sister and closest advisor Kim Yo-Jong met South Korean President Moon Jae-in to extend an invitation for further talks.

"It is too early to say if ... using the Olympics in a way to reduce tension [is] going to have any traction once the Olympics are over, we can't say right now," Mattis said, as quoted by Reuters while en route to Rome.

"In the midst of all this, [Kim] ran a military parade that highlighted his ballistic missiles. That's a very strange time if, in fact, he is trying to feel warming to the country that he has attacked repeatedly as an American puppet, [so], it's too early to tell," he continued.

This echoes US Vice President Mike Pence's sentiments that, despite the recent rapprochement, there will be no official change in US policy toward North Korea until the country abandons its nuclear weapons program.

Reports by US and Iraqi officials apparently confirm Moscow's claims that Russian air strike successfully targeted ISIS leader

Back in June last year the Russian Ministry of Defence published a claim that a meeting of ISIS commanders in May, in the then besieged ISIS 'capital' of Raqqa, included no less a person than ISIS's leader - Ibrahim Abu-Bakr Al-Baghdadi - himself. The meeting was apparently called to plan the escape of ISIS's top leaders from Raqqa. Of these the most important obviously is Al-Baghdadi himself, which was presumably why he attended the meeting.

Russian intelligence apparently got wind of the meeting, and the building in Raqqa where it took place was destroyed in an air strike carried out by a Russian SU-34 fighter bomber belonging to the Russian Aerospace Forces.

The Russians subsequently claimed that Al-Baghdadi himself was killed in the air strike along with a number of other top ISIS officials.

The claim received corroboration from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, but it was refuted by US and Iraqi officials, and I myself expressed skepticism about it on the grounds that Al-Baghdadi's pivotal role in ISIS as its erstwhile "Caliph" meant his death would be expected to have a more visible effect on the organisation than appeared to be the case.

The United States and Russia are discussing steps that should be taken in order to achieve peace in Syria after the cessation of hostilities, Kathleen Kavalec, the US State Department's deputy assistant secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, said.

"We are also talking with Russia about the path forward, once the fighting has ended, towards peace through the Geneva process. And that is something where, it think, both Russia and the United States agree that we want to see peaceful, stable, unified Syria, and something we can work together on," Kavalec said in a video, released by the US Embassy in Russia on Tuesday.

Speaking further, Kavalec said that the US was "really" counting on Russia in the issue of preventing the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria by Damascus.

"Syria is another area where we have been talking ... to see if we can find ways to work together, to try to bring peace to Syria both in the effort to combat ISIS [Daesh, banned in Russia] and in the effort to ensure the safety of Syrian people. For instance, we have had several reports last month about the use of chemical weapons, we really count and depend on Russia to ensure that the Syrian regime stops the use of the chemical weapons," Kavalec said in a video, released by the US Embassy in Russia on Tuesday.

Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman commented on Saturday's events: in response to the alleged interception and downing of an Israeli F-16 by an Iranian drone launched from Syria, the Israeli Air Force attacked targets near the Syrian Palmyra and then bombed a dozen more in the Damascus area.

"There are no restrictions, we do not accept any restrictions. We acted with determination and responded to every provocation. We will continue to defend our vital security interests. To paraphrase the well-known proverb, 'This is not the time to bark, but to bite.' We are bitten hard, I hope we do not have to do it," Avigdor Lieberman during a visit to the northern city of Kiryat Shmona.

The defense minister explained that each side of the conflict has its own version of the events.

"It is clear that each side has its own interests. Each side sees the picture differently. In the years of civil war in Syria, we were able to avoid direct friction, and that is an achievement in itself," he said. "This is an effective relationship."

The minister has for the first time commented on the events of February 10 when the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) reported that one of their Apache attack helicopters downed an Iranian unmanned aerial vehicle over the disputed Golan Heights, which has been at the center of the conflict between Syria and Israel.