The Galil is an assault rifle of Israeli origin. It was developed as during the Six-day war of 1967 it became clear that the FAL was not suitable enough for desert warfare. At the end of the war the decision was made to develop a new assault rifle based upon the Kalashnikov and the new 5.56x45mm cartridge. Two designs were tested. The first design was created by Uziel Gal (who is also the creator of the Uzi) and the second design was developed by Israel Galili. The latter design, based on the Finnish Valmet Rk.62 assault rifle, eventually won the competition and was selected as the new IDF assault rifle.

The design of the Galil was based on the Finnish RK-62 rifle, which in turn is based on the AK-47. The first test batches even incorporated some parts from the RK-62. The Galil is gas operated and uses a long stroke gas piston and a rotating bolt. All versions feature a tubular metal folding stock and all versions except the ARM have a polymer forearm. At first the Galil family consisted of the carbine SAR, full size AR and ARM light support weapon. For export the Galil was also made available in 7.62x51mm NATO. Later on the Galil Sniper was introduced and the MAR is the newest addition. Earlier variants used the long rifling associated with the M193 round. Later production variants use the faster rifling for the SS-109 rounds.

The Galil fires the 5.56x45mm M193 or SS-109 round from a 35 round magazine. The 7.62x51mm NATO models use a 25 round magazine. The Galil is select fire and has a cyclic rate of fire of 650 rpm. The maximum effective range for the full size rifles is 400 meters and for the MAR it is 200 meters. The 7.62mm models have a longer effective range. The Galil Sniper versions fire the 7.62x51mm NATO round from a 10 or 25 round magazine. They are semi-automatic and can be used up to 800 meters.

The Galil was designed for Israeli use. Even though it was adopted the M16 became the standard issue assault rifle for the Israeli forces as they were available from the US at much lower costs. The Galil has been sold to dozens of nations and remain in use with many of them. It is used around the world but is most common in South America. South Africa as one of the best known users as they have produced it under license and developed their own variants. Nowadays the production of the Galil is very limited. The ACE is a product improved Galil which is recently marketed by IWI.