what is Krav Maga (קְרַב מַגָּע)
Krav maga (קְרַב מַגָּע) in Hebrew translates into “Contact Combat”. Krav Maga is a self protection system developed for the IDF (Israeli Defence Force). It incorporates techniques sourced from aikido, Judo, Wrestling and boxing along with realistic fight training. Krav Maga operates around a group of ideas emphasising threat neutralisation, defensive and offensive manoeuvres simultaneously, controlled aggression and situational awareness. Krav Maga in the modern day is no longer just practised by the IDF, it has been adapted for civilian, police and military use.
Krav Maga encourages its practitioners to avoid conflict but when this is not possible or unsafe to do so it is encouraged to finish the fight as soon as possible. The techniques in Krav Maga are not limited to techniques that avoid serious injuries some may even cause permanent injury or death to the opponent. Students will be prepared for the fight or flight moment in a real life threat situation by taking part in various drills which will create a stressful environment and test their mental and physical abilities.
Krav Maga was created by a man called Imi Lichtenfeld (also known as Imi-Sde-Or). Imi grew up in Bratislava. Through his childhood he practised various combat sports such as wrestling and boxing. During the 1930’s antisemitic riots broke out in Bratislava which began to threaten the Jews. Imi lead a group of Jewish wrestlers and boxers that took to the streets to protect the Jewish neighbourhoods from the growing number of antisemitic politicians and thugs. It was through these street altercations that Imi realised that street fighting is nothing like boxing or wrestling. These were good as sports but were not suitable on the street to deal with the aggressive and brutal nature of street combat.
It was through this discovery that he started to re-evaluate his ideas of fighting and began to develop skills and techniques that would become Krav Maga. Due to his involvement in the street fights Imi left his home with his family in 1940 on a refugee ship from Europe. Once Imi made his way to Israel he joined the paramilitary group known as Haganah to protect the jewish refugees from Arabs.
During his time with the Haganah Imi started to train the Haganah’s elite unit, the Palmach, he taught them physical fitness, swimming, wrestling, use of a knife and defence against knife. In 1948 when the state of Israeli was created and IDF formed Imi took over the training of IDF soldiers and became the chief instructor for physical fitness and Krav Maga. Imi served in the IDF for 20 years were he refined and developed his method of self protection and hand to hand combat. Civilians were first started to be taught Krav Maga when Imi retired from the IDF, the first civilian students were taught at the Wingate institute in Netanya.