Judea and Samaria (TPS) – The Israel Police, in conjunction with the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and the IDF conducted one of the year’s biggest operations against weapons manufacturers and smugglers in Judea and Samaria last night.

Colonel Ronen Gufman, who commands the Etzion Brigade, said that “we have been making an effort to locate, expose, and eliminate the illegal weapons industry in Judea and Samaria for the past few months.”

The crackdown netted seven different workshops used for manufacturing weapons, including 22 lathes. Dozens of firearms were also confiscated, and a major arms dealer was arrested in what security forces described as a major crackdown against the phenomenon of illegal weapons, a total of 30 of which were used in terror attacks in 2016 alone.

Security forces have placed a focus on shuttering weapons workshops, many of which were used to make weapons used in terror attacks, most notably the ‘Carlo’ submachine gun. Since the beginning of 2016, security forces have shuttered 29 weapons workshops and confiscated 300 weapons, in addition to arresting 140 people suspected of various weapons offenses.