Iranian Small Arms in Somalia and the Horn of Africa

Since 2015 there have been at least 12 documented arms seizures off the Somalian and Yemeni coastlines by US, Saudi, and a variety of other navies. These weapons seizures range in size from 10s of rifles to hundreds of Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (ATGM) and thousands of Type 56-1 AKs.

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U.S. 5th Fleet Seizure of Arms in the North Arabian Sea

On December 20, 2021, the US Navy’s 5th Fleet intercepted a stateless dhow in the North Arabian Sea carrying arms and ammunition. This was the third interception made by the 5th Fleet during 2021, of dhow carrying SALW towards Yemen with its origin likely being Iran. Notably, this is the first instance of ammunition being found by the 5th Fleet this year.

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Operation Sword Edge – Sayeret Matkal’s Covert Operation

On the night of 11 November, 2018 the prestige of the Israeli elite force, the General Staff Reconnaissance Unit “Sayeret Matkal” was damaged by the Palestinian fighters of the “Al-Qassam Brigades” and the consequences of the operation led to the resignation of notable members of the Israeli government. The Israelis believed that Sayeret Matkal using the latest modern technological means, they could breach the security and military system of the Qassam Brigades, but apparently they failed.

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Pre-State Israeli ‘Revolver’ Ammunition

In the pre-State era of Israel’s existence, it has been well covered both here at Silah Report and elsewhere, that various Jewish armed groups addressed their extreme lack of materiel through clandestine methods. This short article covers one of the interesting ways the pre-State forces supplied ammunition for the wide range of small arms in service.

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A Legal History Civilian Firearms Ownership in Iraq

The earliest Iraqi gun act was enacted in 1919 under the British mandate. Although the original text of this act cannot be found two amendments exist for this act. The first amendment for this act was ratified in 1932. It defined the licensing fees for firearms possession, repairing and selling licenses. The fees were 0.375 … Read more

Albanians fighting in Syria: Xhemati Alban in 2020 – Part 4

This article will focus on the light support weapons shown in the propaganda of Xhemati Alban in 2020. This is the final part of our four part series. The introduction and the first part can be found here, the second part here and the part three here.

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V32: Yousef Riazi and Iranian Small Arms in use by the Iranian Military

In this episode, Miles and Yousef Riazi discuss in great detail the different types, and quality of Iranian-made small arms and the history of the weapons that are issued to the infantry of the Iranian army. As well as Yousef’s experience dealing with them as a former conscript who served in the Iranian army.

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Project: Qasd Al-Sabeel – Recovering Munitions In Gaza

In 2020 Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, revealed for the first time that part of the efforts it is making to develop its military capabilities to face the plans to disarm the Palestinian armed factions along with the blockade of weapons and ammunition into Gaza Strip include salvaging unexploded Israeli munitions and scouring the wrecks of a pair of World War One warships.

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