As the boats began their attack, Barkai ordered them to turn their electronic countermeasures (ECM) on and at the same time proceed to their targets at 40 knots. As they had been during the earlier battle, Syrian radar operators were confused, believing they were tracking five groups of targets with a combined 17 ships between 12 and 15 nautical miles off the coast. The Syrian Navy dispatched two missile boats from Banias and two from Latakia to fire their missiles at the targets.