Israel’s aerospace industry: UAE and Israel jointly develop unmanned military and commercial ships

The UAE and Israeli state-owned weapons manufacturers signed a strategic agreement in Dubai on Thursday to jointly design unmanned ships capable of conducting anti-submarine warfare.

United Arab Emirates Defense Group edge with Israeli Aviation Industry (IAI) announced the partnership on the last day of the biennial Dubai Air Show.

The two companies said in a joint statement that they will design a “170 M” advanced modular unmanned service vessel that can be used for military and commercial purposes.

The deal was reached after the UAE and Israel established diplomatic relations under an agreement last year, and the United States also agreed to sell F-35 fighters to Abu Dhabi.

In March of this year, the aerospace and defense company IAI stated that it would jointly develop an advanced UAV defense system with EDGE.

The UAE-Israeli unmanned ship will be able to operate semi-autonomously and fully autonomously, and perform tasks including submarine detection and anti-submarine warfare.

EDGE CEO Faisal Al Bannai said in a statement: “These developments will open many doors for us in local and global markets, military and commercial markets.”

It can also be used for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, mine detection and mine clearance, and as a deployment platform for certain types of aircraft.

Commercially, it will be able to be customized for oil and gas exploration and several other functions.

The Abu Dhabi Shipyard (ADSB) will design the platform and integrate the control system and payload, while IAI will develop an autonomous control system and integrate the payload into it.

The statement did not specify how much money was invested in the project, nor did it state when it was put into production.