Israel - Forgotten Weapons

Israeli Mauser K98k Sniper Rifles: Wild Heerbrug & Nimrod

January 9, 2026 Ian McCollum 5

The first Israeli military sniper rifles were German K98k snipers obtained by the nascent Israeli armed forces in the late 1940s. These were used in Israel’s independence war, and served well. When the IDF decided […]

Negev 7: Israeli Scales up to a 7.62 NATO Machine Gun

March 31, 2025 Ian McCollum 11

Full video including range footage is available on the History of Weapons & War streaming app: https://forgottenweapons.vhx.tv/videos/negev-7-4k The Israeli Negev machine gun had a rather long development cycle, beginning in 1985 but not seeing final […]

Development of the Uzi Family: Standard, Mini, and Micro

January 4, 2025 Ian McCollum 22

https://youtu.be/y3EIud0KKCM Full video cut available on the History of Weapons & War app. The Uzi was originally designed in the 1950s, and it was on the technological cutting edge at the time. The stamped receiver, […]

Leaning Westward: Galils for Estonia

October 10, 2024 Ian McCollum 0

When Estonia regained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, it was initially armed with a wide variety of miscellaneous small arms. They clearly needed a primary standardized rifle for the new armed forces. […]

MAGAL: A Galil in .30 Carbine for the Israeli Police

July 24, 2024 Ian McCollum 30

In the early 1990s, Israeli Military Industries (IMI) developed the Galil MAR (Micro Assault Rifle) and the MAGAL at the same time. Both were intended to be very compact rifles, with the MAR in 5.56mm […]

Fort 221: The Ukrainian Tavor TAR

June 21, 2024 Ian McCollum 1

In 2008, Ukrainian manufacturing conglomerate RPC Fort received a license from IMI to produce a variety of Israeli small arms, including the Tavor TAR and Tavor X95. In Fort’s catalog, these were designated the Fort-221 […]

Gilboa Snake: Is the Double-AR Really so Dumb?

March 11, 2024 Ian McCollum 79

The Gilboa Snake is an Israeli rifle (from the same designer behind the Cornershot) that essentially combines two standard ARs into a single unit. In its civilian configuration it has two of every part – […]

Hammerli FK-31: Diopter Competition Rifles for the Haganah

January 15, 2024 Ian McCollum 2

In 1949, Israel was still fighting its war of independence, and purchasing arms internationally was difficult to do. The recently-formalized IDF wanted sniper rifles, and looked to Hammerli in Switzerland for a variant of the […]

A Sneaky Swiss Sniper for Israel: the ZK-31

September 6, 2023 Ian McCollum 12

In 1949, Israel was still fighting its was of independence, and purchasing arms internationally was difficult to do. The recently-formalized IDF wanted sniper rifles, and looked to Hammerli in Switzerland for a variant of the […]

An Israeli LMG, Part II: The 8mm Dror

June 8, 2022 Ian McCollum 61

Today we continue the story of the Dror. Shortly after production of the .303 pattern guns began, the directive came down that the gun was to be redesigned for 8mm Mauser ammunition. Israeli supplies of […]