Playing defense, Israeli style

Students can learn Krav Maga, the Israeli method for self-defense, all over the world. But some prefer to train in the country where it was born.

"The FBI, the Mossad, the CIA agents, law enforcement, SWAT - all over the world, all of them are using Krav Maga," says Avi Moyal, an international instructor of the Israeli self-defense system. "Part of the understanding of Krav Maga is to see the environment of Israel, the Holy Land, where it was created. I think you cannot understand a system if you don't come to the source.

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One hundred years after the Technion’s cornerstone was laid, the now world-famous science and technology institute celebrates its achievements.
 
By Avigayil Kadesh

"Israel can win the battle for survival only by developing expert knowledge in technology," said the great scientist Albert Einstein in 1923. He had come to the Jewish homeland to plant a palm tree in his capacity as the first president of the Technion Society. The following year, what is now the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology opened in Haifa with 17 students -- 16 men and one woman.

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By  NHL | Monday, 19 March 2012 10:15

Muscles can be toned, endurance can be refined, leadership qualities can be taught. But how do you train a hockey player’s brain? Can a coach work the areas of a player’s brain responsible for awareness and intuition?

The Israeli Air Force, of all people, has the answer.

More specifically, the answer comes from Applied Cognitive Engineering, or ACE, an Israeli technology company that has worked with the Israelis and the U.S. Air Force, as well as NASA and the American military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Originally used to train fighter pilots, ACE’s IntelliGym is now being adopted by more and more hockey coaches.

Read more on Israeli brain technology at NHL. 

While all over the Middle East human rights are violated in an unprecedented scale, the HRC ridicules itself by dedicating its time and resources to establish a superfluous and extravagant body.

The resolution by the Human Rights Council to establish a "Fact Finding Mission on the Influence of Settlements on Palestinians" is yet another surrealistic decision from the workshop of a Council that is instrumentalized as a tool to push for one-sided politicized moves instead of promoting human rights.

While all over the Middle East human rights are violated in an unprecedented scale, the HRC ridicules itself by dedicating its time and resources to establish a superfluous and extravagant body whose sole purpose is to satisfy the Palestinians' whims and to harm future chances to reach an agreement through peaceful means. The Palestinians must understand that they can't have it both ways: they can't enjoy cooperation with Israel and at the same time initiate political clashes in international fora.

Turning to international bodies is a breach of concluded Israeli Palestinian agreements. Had the Palestinians wanted to solve the settlements issue, they would resume without delay direct and unconditional negotiations on all core issues within the framework of a comprehensive agreement. Their deliberate choice to foster confrontation and provocation rather than compromise and reconciliation is nothing but a destructive strategy that the international community should firmly reject.

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Photo: President Peres with French FM Juppe in Jerusalem (Photo: Flash90)

President Shimon Peres on Wednesday, March 21, met with French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, who arrived in Israel in order to attend the funerals of those who were murdered in the recent terrorist attack in Toulouse. At the start of the meeting, President Peres told his guest, in French, “I thank you for sharing in our peoples’ sorrow at this difficult time. This is a special expression of the deep ties between France and Israel. Your arrival and the actions of President Sarkozy in light of these harsh events prove that Israel and France are on the same front both in seeking peace and in the total war against terrorism. The people in Israel and in the Diaspora communities were moved by the expressions of grief and consolation that have been voiced in France and by the government’s actions. Children are more precious than anything and everything must be done to ensure their peace, in the future as well.”

President Peres praised President Sarkozy’s clear and harsh line against Iran’s arming itself with nuclear weapons, stressed that the Iranian danger is a tangible threat to the entire world and commended the recent steps, especially the tightening of the embargo on the export of Iranian oil and the stopping of financial activity by the Iranian banking system.

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