Israel’s M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System fires during the International Military Innovation Conference at the Tze’elim urban warfare training centre (UWTC) base, in southern Israel on September 15, 2022. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP) (Photo by JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Images)
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In a striking reminder of the role Middle Eastern powers are playing in arming both sides in the Russia-Ukraine war, the United States is preparing to authorize a transfer by Turkey of American-made M270 multiple rocket systems and accompanying M39 ATACMS ballistic missiles to embattled Ukraine. At the same time, Iran has reportedly modified another one of its Shahed series of loitering munitions based directly on combat lessons derived from Russia’s war on Ukraine. Ankara and Tehran armed Kyiv and Moscow respectively before and since the war began in February 2022 with Russia’s full-scale invasion. These latest developments show there’s little let-up in them doing so.
According to an August 6 letter submitted to Congress, Washington is ready to give Ankara the necessary authorization to “retransfer” 12 M270 MLRS launchers and 70 M39 ATACMS missiles to Ukraine. The proposed $256 million deal also includes 2,524 unguided M26 rockets fitted with DPICM cluster warheads and 47,000 M509A1 203mm DPICM artillery rounds. Turkey has had these weapons in its stockpiles for several decades now and wants to dispense with them as it modernizes its arsenal. These weapons could help bolster Ukraine’s surface-to-surface firepower in its depleting and grinding war with Russia.
In a news release published Tuesday, Human Rights Watch sharply criticized the deal for including the cluster warheads, which it described as “inherently indiscriminate” as well as “obsolete,” “inaccurate and unreliable.” The rights group accordingly urged Congress to halt what it called a “short-sighted and dangerous transfer.”
It’s worth recalling that Ukraine previously received at least 18 shipments of Turkish-made M483A1 cluster munitions in 2023. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute’s arms transfer database, Ankara also supplied six of its homegrown T-300 MLRS in 2022 and 200 Kirpi armored personnel carriers between 2022 and 2024 and 50 Cobra-2 APCs in 2023.
Reports of this latest transfer coincided with new indications that Iran has been “refining” its Shahed-107 loitering munition based directly on experience of the Ukraine war. Since the first year of that war, Iran provided several thousand Shahed-type drones, primarily Shahed-136 and 131s, along with technology transfers, allowing Russia to routinely target Ukrainian cities and electricity infrastructure while simultaneously straining its air defenses. Tehran allowed Moscow to produce these drones in enormous numbers locally. Since at least 2023, these Shaheds, designated Geran 1 and Geran 2s by Russia’s military, used modified warheads tailor-made to meet Moscow’s requirements, including a multipurpose one designed for causing maximum destruction against Ukrainian infrastructure.
That trend continues to the present day. According to Ukrainian military analyst Oleksandr Kovalenko, Iran modified the Shahed-107 to carry additional fragmentation components to, in the words of a report by Ukraine’s Euromaidan Press, increase “their lethality against people and soft targets.”
In addition to supplying Russia loitering munitions and attack drones, Tehran is also believed to have transferred Fath 360 close-range ballistic missiles in 2024. However, it’s not known to have transferred Fattah-110 short-range ballistic missiles as many feared earlier in the war. Furthermore, Ukrainian intelligence, which estimates that Tehran supplied more than 350 of these missiles, hasn’t yet seen any indication that Russia has used these Iranian-made CRBMs in the war as of January 2026.
Turkey sold its iconic Bayraktar TB2 drones to Ukraine before and since the war began. They played an important role early in the war in staving off Russia’s ill-fated ground offensive aimed at seizing Kyiv and bringing about a swift collapse in Ukrainian defenses. They have played a more limited role since. By the end of 2022, with the introduction of Shaheds into the conflict, it was already clear that Middle Eastern powers had armed both sides of Europe’s most destructive conflict since World War II.
Aside from Iran, other countries in the wider Middle East region have supplied armaments and military equipment for Ukraine, much of it financed by the United States. According to SIPRI, these included 14 Titan-S APCs made by the United Arab Emirates but financed by U.S. aid, 60 German-made Gepard air defense systems from Jordan, specifically the Cheetah version, also financed by U.S. aid. According to the database, Germany also financed a transfer of 12 PzH-2000 155mm artillery guns from Qatar that were delivered in 2024 and 2025. Berlin also financed a transfer of 15 Gepard systems from Doha completed in 2023.
Looking back, Turkey and Iran took the most active roles by far in arming the warring sides with their homegrown weapons while other U.S. allies acceded to providing some weapons paid for by the U.S. and Germany. Despite repeated requests from Ukraine and even the U.S., which at one stage requested retired MIM-23 Hawk missiles, Israel for years declined to provide or sell any lethal weapons to Kyiv. It pointed to Russia’s presence in Syria during the rule of former President Bashar al-Assad, claiming that any supply of weapons to Ukraine by Israel could circumscribe Israel’s freedom of action against Iran’s presence in Syria. However, since Assad was deposed in December 2024 by the opposition, that argument appeared less credible than ever.
Replying to journalists’ questions on August 8, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy again brought up Kyiv’s interest in Israeli military hardware. “We would like to receive air defense systems from them as well,” he said. “We would be ready to buy them. So far, we do not have that opportunity, although we are in dialogue.”
While Israel hasn’t supplied any of its homegrown air defenses, it made its retired MIM-104 Patriot PAC-2s available to Ukraine by sending them back to the United States. Israel never had any love lost for those Patriots, while Ukraine doubtlessly welcomes any it can get from anywhere.
As outlined here earlier in the war, Egypt acquired some modern Russian military equipment, including MiG-29M/M2 fighter jets and S-300VM air defense systems that Ukraine would have welcomed acquiring. Cairo never offered them. In 2023, The Washington Post reported that Egypt’s government planned to produce up to 40,000 Sakr-45 122mm rockets for Russia. However, within months, Cairo not only shelved that deal but approved an alternative arrangement in which it would produce 152mm and 155mm artillery rounds to sell to the United States for transfer to Ukraine.
While most Middle East countries won’t become major arms suppliers in the Russia-Ukraine war, especially now that the region is embroiled in another destructive war of its own, it’s also unlikely that any will join Iran, with the possible exception of its militia allies, in supplying Russia’s war machine anytime soon. While that may be welcome news in Ukraine, it’s still not nearly enough to decisively tilt the military balance in its favor.
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