Culture

Podcast V26 – Part Four: Bombardment of Ismalia and Galal’s Close Calls

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In this article we continue our interview with Egyptian artist Galal Abdo Hashem. When we reached the Six-Day War, the War of Attrition and October War in our interview with Galal, we tried to get all the possible details we could from him. In the end, he told us that he will speak about the notable incidents as he has many stories that would take months to cover. In this part of our series we will examine the bombardment of Ismalia in 1967. The city was bombarded throughout the War of Attrition, but Galal gave us a few incidents that mainly occurred in 1967 after the Six Day war. 

If you missed earlier parts of the interview, you can find them here: Part One, Part Two, Part Three.

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Silah Report on High Caliber History Podcast

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Our Khan in Chief, Miles Vining, was recently a guest on historian Logan Metesh’s High Caliber History podcast. The episode, titled “Khyber Pass Guns” is a No-No!, sees Miles and Logan discuss a whole range of subjects including the driving force behind Silah Report, Miles’ interest in MENA firearms and culture, why ‘Khyber Pass guns’ is a misnomer and Miles’ new book.

Here’s the description from Logan’s podcast:

Today’s guest is Miles Vining, one of the co-founders of Silah Report. He’s here to tell us why we should stop referring to Middle Eastern firearms copies as Khyber Pass guns, plus plenty of other great conversation!

You can buy Miles’ new book, Into Helmand with the Walking Dead, on Amazon.

Support the show on Patreon.

Snag some HCH merch or some HCH patches & stickers.

Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.

 

If you enjoy our work here at Silah Report please consider supporting us on Patreon!

Podcast V28: Noori, The Iraqi Gun Engraving Artisan

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Welcome to the 28th episode of the Silah Report Podcast, we recently had the pleasure of speaking with Noori, an artisan who runs a business of handcrafting decorations on firearms in Iraq. We have covered Noori’s interesting work in past articles here at Silah Report. To say that the quality of his artwork is incredibly professional and its quality is extremely beautiful would be an understatement. In our interview with him, we enquired in-depth abut Iraqi gun culture, his background, how he entered the field, his business in a war-torn country, the challenges he faced and what does think the future holds for him.

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Podcast V26 – Part Three: Galal Abdo Hashem – Defiance, Victory and the Dream

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In our journey to uncover wartime stories from all sides during the Arab-Israeli Conflict, we managed to meet Galal Abdo Hashem, an Egyptian living in his home city of Ismalia, a city that has witnessed the horrors of war more than once during the 20th century. Galal Abdo Hashem is not a war veteran with military training, in fact, he never fired a single shot towards his enemies, but he decided to do something instead that gained him notoriety and his name written on Egypt’s Honor List. To this day he gives lectures, speaks with journalists, and appears on TV shows to speak about his experience and journey during a time when Egypt was at war with Israel. This article is the story of one of Egypt’s civilians who, despite taking up arms to defend his homeland, decided there was another way to contribute to the war effort – art.

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Khyber Market Finds: The Mauser M1916 – A WWI Rarity (Part 1)

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On our many travels to the gun markets and arms manufacturing hubs of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, we’ve encountered many interesting firearms, some of which are the envy of collectors the world over. The latest example of one of these finds is one of the rarer and more valuable firearms we have come across. Several examples of World War One-vintage Mauser M1916 Selbstladekarabiner (self-loading carbine) have been found.

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Syrian Civil War Crest Symbology: Comparative Conclusion

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In this series we have examined Syrian armed groups from across the entire political spectrum who at one point or another during the war featured a firearm in their official crest. Our goal is to present a statistical overview of the small arms used in this military imagery and to share some interesting information I was able to deduce. You can find the first three parts of this series here, here and here. In this fourth and final part, we will make a comparative overview of all the political affiliations fighting previously focused on throughout the previous posts. 

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Origins: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Clear Frame Glock Pistols

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The Glock line of rugged and reliable polymer-framed, self-loading pistols have become a staple of the firearms market and community – military and law-enforcement alike – worldwide. Still, features pop up that can’t be attributed to Glock and this is true for these mystery clear-frame Glock pistols which have become available on the Pakistani market in recent years. Who makes these clear frame Glock copies though? Where did they come from? What is the purpose? Do they even work? All these questions and more have been asked by people the world over. To understand why and how these came to be, we must first look deeper.

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Origins: Darra’s PPSh-41 Franken-Builds

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There have been a few images circulating on social media depicting several PPSh-41-patterned submachine guns modified with blasphemous ‘tacticool’ configurations. Locally, these submachine guns are called the ‘Papusha‘ and are chambered in the same 7.62×25mm pistol cartridge as the original guns. The 7.62×25mm round is locally known as .30 bore. Almost all of these images can be traced back to Pakistan, specifically Darra Adamkhel, where dealers have them displayed in their shopfronts and also on their social media pages.

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Syrian Civil War Small Arms Symbology: Syrian Democratic Forces in Rojava

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In this series we have examined Syrian armed groups from across the entire political spectrum who at one point or another during the war featured a firearm in their official crest. Our goal is to present a statistical overview of the small arms used in this military imagery and to share some interesting information I was able to deduce. You can find the first part of this series here and the second part here, the Opposition and Regime respectively.

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The Work of Iraqi Firearms Engraver Noori Sabeh

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Noori Sabeh (نوري النقاش) is a professional engraver from Iraq who has made a presence on social media with some excellent engraving work, considering his lack of access to materials and tools otherwise very prevalent in Europe and North America. The majority of his work is focused on traditional wood and metal engraving of various bolt action rifles, shotguns, and handguns that customers send in. He originally started out in the jewellery business and has been engraving for several decades.

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