TEL AVIV, Sept 9: Uziel Gal, the inventor of the “Uzi” submachinegun used in countless wars, commando missions and action films, has died of cancer at the age of 78.

Gal’s family said the Israeli gunsmith died on Saturday in the United States, where he had lived in relative obscurity for a quarter of a century after inventing the Uzi in the early 1950s.

“Obviously, he was proud to be identified with the product of his craftsmanship,” Gal’s son, Iddo, said in a telephone interview from the family home in Pennsylvania. “But he was also a modest man who made efforts to move on to other things.”

He said Gal’s remains would be brought to Israel for burial in his former home of Kibbutz Yagur on Thursday.

“Uzi” is an abbreviation of the Hebrew phrase “God is my might”.—Reuters