Special Night Squads

The Special Night Squads (SNS) (Hebrew: Plugot Ha'Layla Ha'Meyukhadot, פלוגות הלילה המיוחדות) were a joint British-Jewish counter-insurgency unit, established by Captain Orde Wingate in Mandatory Palestine in 1938, during the 1936-1939 Arab revolt. The SNS basically comprised British infantry soldiers, together with some men drawn from the Jewish Supernumerary Police, and total unit strength was 100 by 1938. Wingate selected his men personally, among them Yigal Allon and Moshe Dayan, and trained them to form small mobile striking units. Wingate also collaborated with the Jewish paramilitary formation, the Haganah, reinforcing his unit with some of Haganah's Fosh commandos. Given British opposition to the formal creation of Jewish military units, it is not clear to what degree the authorities were aware of the exact details of Wingate's operations in this regard.

The origins of night squads has been discerned in the creation of specialized units in both the northern frontier of India, where Gurkhas were trained to control indigenous insurgents after WW1, and to similar military structures, such as the Black and Tans deployed in Ireland to repress the Irish War of Independence.

Wingate, an intelligence officer of the British army's General Headquarters (GHQ) in Jerusalem, examined sabotage and weapon smuggling operations in northern Palestine (Galilee). During March 1938, after several weeks of experimental ambushes and patrols, he had gained permission from the British General Officer Commanding (GOC), Lieutenant-General Archibald Wavell, to establish a joint British-Jewish unit for night operations against the Arab insurgents. However, the Jewish Agency had opposed this venture at first, resulting in its postponement until early June.

...
Wikipedia