The instruction to change the direction of the aircraft from Tel Aviv to Moscow came from the dispatcher 
The press service of Aeroflot Airlines explained the reason for the change of direction by a passenger plane in the Black Sea. This is reported by RIA Novosti.
As explained by the airline, the plane flying from Tel Aviv to Moscow did receive a command to change the echelon: first to Fl 330, and then to Fl 310. “The instruction was received from the air traffic controller and was due to the fact that the trajectory was crossing another aircraft, ”they added.
The incident took place in the morning of December 4. A US reconnaissance aircraft crossed established civil aviation routes and approached a passenger Airbus. The American pilots did not respond to inquiries from the ground. A passenger plane en route Tel Aviv – Moscow was forced to change direction in order to avoid a rapprochement with a US reconnaissance aircraft over the Black Sea.
Later it became known that the evasion of a military aircraft moving towards a Russian civilian liner had to be done at an altitude of ten kilometers. After the US Air Force reconnaissance ignored the signals from the passenger plane and from the ground control, the airliner first lowered the altitude by half a kilometer, and then climbed a kilometer.