Azerbaijan is said to have defeated Armenia using Israeli-made drones or drones when launching military operations in Nagorno-Karabakh.
The battle took place in mid-September. A number of witnesses heard an explosion which may have come from a drone.
Residents in Stepanakert also uploaded a video containing the sound of propellers roaring and the sky looking gray.
Defense observers from the Applied Police Research Institute (APRI) of Armenia, said the sound was a Harop or known as a suicide drone, a weapon made by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI).
The ammunition is known for the piercing sound it produces when it lands.
Former Azerbaijani officials also said they used Harop kamikaze, Hermes-450, Orbiter-K, Orbiter 1, Orbiter 2, Orbiter-3 drones. All of these drones are made by Israeli arms companies.
Regarding these drones, a former lieutenant colonel in the Artsakh Defense Army, the military of the Armenian separatist republic in Karabakh, said Azerbaijan continues to use these weapons to control Nagorno-Karabakh.
“Drones are used constantly [in the 2020 war, as well as in this latest conflict,” he told CNN , Thursday (5/10).
Azerbaijani forces used Harop and other Israeli drones throughout the 2020 war.
Azerbaijan won the war that year in less than a month. They regained most of the territory in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Then, fighting in September this year brought all of Karabakh under Azerbaijan’s control after months of blockade.
According to researchers, many Israeli weapons are imported to Azerbaijan. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said that more than 60 percent of Azerbaijan’s arms imports came from Israel between 2017 and 2020.
Azerbaijan, continued SIPRI, also purchased various kinds of drones, missiles and mortars from Israel between 2010 and 2020.
However, there are several specific unknowns regarding the extent of the ongoing Azerbaijan-Israel arms trade.
“We had quite a lot of information before 2020 and then it stopped. And, that doesn’t make sense,” said SIPRI senior researcher Pieter Wezeman.
He then said, “Because in 2020 Azerbaijan used a large amount of its equipment, it is very likely that they will continue their relations with Israel. That’s all as far as we know.”
Now, Israel-Azerbaijan relations are under scrutiny, including from Israel’s most prominent left-wing newspaper, Haaretz .
In one of Haaretz’s releases an editorial appeared entitled “Israel’s fingerprints after ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh” which was published on September 27.
Source : CNN
