Operation Serval of the ground and the populations". Mathieu Guidère, a scholar of Islam and the Arab world at the University of Toulouse, said in an interview published in the newsmagazine Jeune Afrique, that without the French military intervention the state of Mali would have fallen. France's stated rationale for the operation is that to do otherwise would allow "a terrorist state at the doorstep of France and Europe." Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the intervention in a phone call with French President François Hollande as "a brave step against extremist Islamic terrorism". Egypt's former President Mohammed Morsi, an Islamist, criticized
Russian military intervention in the Syrian Civil War urged investiagation of war crimes. On 15 October 2016, the aircraft carrier sailed from Kola Bay at the centre of a task group, which included the "Kirov"-class missile cruiser , a pair of s and other vessels, to deploy to the Mediterranean in support of Russian forces operating in Syria. "Admiral Kuznetsov"s jets were reported to be flying off the Syrian coast on 8 November. On 14 November, a MiG-29K crashed en route back to the carrier following a planned mission over Syria, while an Su-33 crashed, again while trying to recover to "Admiral Kuznetsov" following a sortie on 5