COVER STORY SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

cost has been in human lives. But -":there's another price: Terror andwar have driven away tourists andforeign investors, boosted taxes, =~~dragged down the economy.They've also forced Israelis to devotemuch of their ingenuity and resources toprotecting themselves. Now, suddenly, thewhole Western world fears suicide hi-jackers, high-rise death traps, bio-booby-trapped letters and dangers that don't quitehave a name. Those apprehensions havebrought increasing numbers of govern-ments and businessmen to Israeli finns,

looking for the expertise and productsneeded to make people safer.

Already on the marketplace areproducts ranging from a made-in-Israel self-opening parachute designedfor escape from burning skyscrapersto super-sophisticated warning sys-tems that can protect airports, fuel tank"farms" and other high-risk installa-tions from intruders. Just patented andabout to hit the market is Magal Se-curity Services's "immobilizer" that

will keep terrorists from stealing smallplanes to load them with high explosivesordeadly biochemical agents. Still in devel-opment, but attracting sudden attention,is aflying platform designed by Ashdodengi-neer David Metreveli to rise upthe sides ofskyscrapers and carry stranded terror or

since then," says CEO Michael Bar-EI. Inthe last two months, he's tripled his workforce from 150 to 450, working three shiftsaround the clock.

It's hard to know whether to laugh orcry: At the dark edges of Israeli life havealways been terrorism and the fear of ex-ternal attack. The most obvious and painful

them. The phone was ringing off the hook."He adds: "There's a sense that Israeliequipment is good."

Many of the masks Lopez sold weremade at Shalon Chemicals of Kiryat Gat, aNegev town plagued with unemployment.Until recently, Shalon hardly sold to any-one except Israel's Defense Ministry; for-eign consumers saw no need to protectthemselves against biological or chemicalattack. Then came September II, the an-thrax scare and the fear of terrorist attackswith chemical or biological weapons."We've had tens of thousands of orders

Gas-mask maker Shalon Chemicalshas tripled its staff in the past twomonths from 150 to 450, working threeshifts around the clock

HE DISPLAY CASES ATWeiss & Mahoney, an army-navy store on Fifth Avenuein Manhattan, are filled withcommando knives, militaryuniforms and outdoor-survival books. On the frontcounter is a sign, handwrit-

ten in black ink on white cardboard: "NoGas Masks, Don't Have Anymore!"

The gas masks in question arrive fromIsrael - when they arrive. Larry Lopez,the store's wiry manager, says he's hadtrouble keeping them in stock since

September II. "They come in and they goright out," says Lopez, who wears a blackbaseball cap with a "U.S. Army Veteran"logo. "People are still nervous."

In the first days after the Trade Centerattack, Lopez estimates, the store fieldedup to 3,000 requests a day for gas masks."People were packing the place looking for

For decades, Israel has relied on brainpower to help boost its security.In the anxious new world, sadly, there's unprecedented interestin the innovative products of that bitter experience.

Hanan Sher and Erik Schechter

Israeli In enu~Takeson10 lYe r

34 THE JERUSALEM REPORT DECEMBER 17, 2001

GALLERY OF GADGETRY: Israteam's emergency skyscraper evacuationdevice, Duram's escape mask and Beth-EI's Raiinbow air-filtration system

·.;ESTEBAN ALTERMAN

disaster victims to safety.Expertise is also in high demand. Israeli

companies, many of them staffed by vet-erans of specialized army units, offer air-port security staffing, special forces-styletraining for guards, and consultancy inpreparing for chemical and biologicalattacks.

Israeli security has always had a goodreputation; the country has been exportingsimilar goods and services for years. Salesof civil defense products and servicesamounted to almost a tenth ofIsrael's $2.5billion in defense exports in 2000. Butsince September II, there has been a sharpupturn of interest. A steady stream ofvisitors has been flying quietly into Ben-Gurion Airport, shopping for made-in-Israel security. The callers include gov-ernment officials, representatives of estab-lished companies selling defense-relatedproducts - and a series of entrepreneurs.

With understandable sensitivity, Israelibusinessmen such as Jacob Even-Ezra ofMagal prefer to talk cautiously about the

COURTESY OURAM

financial implications of theemerging interest. But the factis that Magal - a maker of so-phisticated electronic fencesand intruder-detection systems- recently signed a contract toprovide the perimeter-defensesegment of a $30-million-plusnew security system at Chica-go's busy O'Hare airport.While negotiations on theO'Hare contract had begun be-fore September II, since thenMagal has had dozens of se-rious inquiries from additionalfacilities on the list of 110 ma-jor U.S. airports.

David Birnbaum, anAmerican businessman of theNew York-based DefenseTechnologies, is currently de-veloping security packages ofequipment and expertise thatcan be sold to corporateAmerica. In early November,

THE JERUSALEM REPORT DECEMBER 17,2001

•---

35

COVER STORY SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

the fea.r of non-co. nven.tional terror to (;.01·1 tack is to make.a whole room safe Immlow, prompted the biggl.'St surge in demand. gases - and desire for that solution is alsoBut fears ofanthrax - fueled by the series outpacing supply. At the showroom ofof deaths from mhalatlon anthrax - may Beth-EI Indusln~ improbably locatedeonlnbute to funher interest. The question aeTUS..<;the street from the historic Carmel

An Israeli adaptation of cannabiscan be used to counteract the deadlyeffects of gases like sarin

8irnbaum engaged in inlensi\'e con~ulta-lions with possible partners during a onc-week trip to ISnlc!. lIow much Ismcl'sproducts and expertise will be sought after,he stR'Sses. will fit together only as thebigger picture - including the post~Afghanistan warcapabilitics ofOsama Hinladen's al-Q-d'eda and of other terrorgroups - oc"Come clearer.

No one can say for ccnain how manyincreasingly hard-to-gct dollars Americanswill layout for sophisticated escarc andanti-NBC (nuclear. biological and chem-ical) systems, or whether demand in othercountries will parallel thai in the U.S. Yetthe purch3-<oesalready being made. the in-terest shown, the products in the pipelineall indicate that in an anxious new world,people will be looking toward Israel forsl..'curity.

The First Line of DefenseThere's simple e\'idencc of how suJdl.'1\ly,unexpectedly the new wa,'e of demand forga~ ma~ks hit Shalon Chemicals. Since lhetense months hefore the 1991 Gulf War,every I~raeli is ~upposed to have a gov-ernment-issue mask. Foreign demand isnew for the three types of mash Shalonproduces for the civilian market. Most fa-miliar is the adult \'ersion with two eye-pieces and a round filter protruding fromlhe front like an animal snout. The com+pany also makes a pressurized plastic hoodfor young children and a mini-tent forinfants.

"Du~iness increased 600 percent in thethree weeks after September II," saysSamuel Hcrshbcrg of Platinum Defense,Shalon's ~tiami-hascd distributor. Hersh-Ix.-rgsays that he recently sold over 100,000mash in just one wholesale shipment. Andhe reports thut consumer interest hasspawned an online Internet market forsecond-hand Israeli mas.ks. The companywarns. howC\·I.'1",lhat such old products -which can be sponed by the Hebrew-onlyinstructions - may be next to useless.

Initial panic after Black Tuesday_ and

of whether non-conventional terror is re-ally an immediatc danger, or of how ef-fective the masks would be against gennwurfare, olkn seems to be overlooked.

"Temlr will not disappear quickly, andthe war against it, if you believe the Amer-ican govemlTK.'1\t, will go on for a fewyears:' notl.'S Rar-E1 soberly. Indeed. for-eign investors and marketing panners havealready come knocking on Shalon 's door.

Even if they fear terror allw.:ks, though,must people are not going to shlep a full-si/.ed gas mask -too large to fit in a hand-bag - with them to the office or mall. Oneinnovatory altemati'e - gal>ma<;k lite, asit were - is the ~escape mask" made byDurnm, a finn owned by Kibbutz RamatHakoves.h, northC'dst of Tel Aviv. Durnm'sdc\ice weighs only ISO gmms (5.3ounces); unlike conventional gas masks, itfits over a beard or long hair.

''Our masks are small enough to fit intoa purse or briefea<;e or the pocket of anoverall __ so that they can be used no mat-ter where you are," explains Dumm man-ager Benny Nur. They are dl.'Signed to pro-tectagain~t smoke, chemical toxins or evenanthrax spme~ in the eruciullirst half hourafter an attack or di!'>3ster,until convention-al decontamination procedun.-s get stanedand there is a chance of evacuating victims.

Duram, which makes various rubberproducts, ha<;been !>Cllingthc smoke masksfor over a dC{;ade; its customers includepulice SWAT teams and fire departmentsand defense agencies in Ismcl and abroad,ineluding the Pentagon and the FBI in theUnited Stales. "In war or time of tmgedy:'Nursays, "our orders increase. They did soin 1993, after the first Twin Towers attack,again in 1995 when Japanese terrorists re-leased sarin nerve gas in a Tokyo subway,and in 1996-97, when the United Statesstarted to talk ahout the dangers of bio-logieal or chemical terror:'

Since September II, Nur says, demandis five tirTk..'Snormal. The Durd.l1l plant isnow producing about 5,000 masks a monlh.

An alternati,·e approach to chemical at-

Minachi winery in Zikhron Va 'akov, southof Haifa, the sales staff infonns customersthat deliveries on its nagship Rainbow air-filtration system for homes can't bepromised in less than six wccks. DanielShimoni, a Beth-EI project manager, re-ports an "unimaginable" increase in for-eign inquiries for Rainbow.

The system, introduced I II months ago,comes in two parts, each aooutthe size of asmull suitcase. It's dcsigned to be used in asealed room of a house or apanment -since ]991 pan of the standard Israeli pro-tection against NBC attack. The customerhas 10 prepare the room by sealing all win-dows and cracks. lllen the Rainbow -which takes a few minutes to install -

slightly pressurizes the room to insure thatno unwanted gast.'S get in. It also draws inand purifies breathing air while pushingcarbon dioxide out. Running on householdelectricity, it can protect six people forthree to four months, "That's enough timefor anny NBC teams to clean up anthraxspores aller a major uuack," suys chemicalweapons expert Danny Shoham, at Bar-lIan University's BESA Center. And if thepo ••••.er goes off, there's an emer-gcncy OOt-tcry that lasts 10 hours, and an accon.1ion-shap..:d hand pump.

Shimoni says that Beth-EI - set up byfollowers of German Protl.~tant preachl"Emma Rergcr who moved here in the 60s- has had feelers from foreign investors,but ha •• turned them all down so far. Thephilo-Semitic group's original goal in de-signing the system at the time of the GulfWar, he explains, ••••..a<;to prolecl Jews from

THEJERUSALEMREPOAT DECEMBER 11.2001

Where Eagles DareHow an aborted Russian plan for a safer space shuttle gave riseto an immigrant scientist's revolutionary rescue craftMitchell Ginsburg

maintenance crews and even windowwashers. Since September II, both tiredepartments and private companiesha\'c been in conlact.

NEWURGENCY; Metreveli andan artist's rendition of his Eagle in flight

airplanes and missiles; its wans areden!>Cly covered with his own out-landish paintings.

But his passion is neither for paint~ing, nor for his 9 to 5 job in aeronauticalengineering: It's for innovation, and it isnow manifesting itself in a pet project,the Eagle. "I work for bread:' says Me-treveli, who immigrated to Israel fromthe fonncr Soviet republic of Georgia in1993, "but the Eagle is what puts in-terest into my life."

rhe Eagle is a Vertical Takcotf andLanding craft - a propeller-poweredvehicle that can take off, land and hoverin tight spaces. Privately developed byMetreveli and a handful of fellow en-thusiasts in Israel on,r the past fouryears or so, it's a three-level construe-

lion: pilot at the top. up to ]0 passen-gers in the middle, mechanics at thebottom

It is kept airborne by propellers -like any helicopter. But unlike conven-

tional open-propellersystems, its rotor bladesare housed inside ilsbody, and rotate in a rel-atj,'ely small circle. en-abling illO slip into nar-row canyons or scalehigh buildings in denseareas. That's what makesit unil/ue and why, postSeptember II, c-mails

~ arc f1~ing in Irom po-d tentialmvcstors.; As the Twin Towers~ burned on September II,~ se\'eral helicopters cir-~ eled the buildings, inef-

fectually, their rotors preventing themfrom coming near enough to manageany rescue effort. in theory, Metreveli'sEagle could have tlown up alongsideany window on any floor, and ferried upto IOpeople to safety al a time.

While there'~ been no shortage ofinventors touting rescue apparatusessince September I I, not all oflhem passdose scrutiny. Metreveli's craft, how-ever, already has something of a trackrecord: In the summer of 1995, Metrev-eli successfully tlew and maneuvered aI: I() scale model of the Eagle by radiocontrol. Now, he is working with a 1:4!>Caleversion, and envisages completingits testing - with a pilot this time -within a year. "I hope there will be manycomplications during this stage,"' hesays disarmingly, "because if we findIhem now they won't rear their headslater."'

Assuming all goes to plan, the final,full-sized cmft would be unveiled fouryears from now, and he believes it couldthen he produced at $500,000 per unit.Till then, of course, money is a majorfaclor: He has one solid imcstor signedup, and he and his wlleagues pitch in,but that still leaves him well short ofhisideal million-dollar annual budget.

Metreveli had always envisaged po-tential buyers among fire departments,mountain re!>Cue teams, power line

THE JERUSAl.EM REPORT DECEMBER 17, 2001

THE GENESIS Of THE EAGLEactually long predates Mctrevcli'sarrival in IsHlel: In 1986, when the

U.S. Challenger Sp<lce Shuttle explodedduring liftoff, Melreveli was a youngaeronautical engineer completing hisPhd at the Moscow Aviation institute,Attempting to try and learn the lessonsof the disask ..•., key architects of theRussian space program began consid-ering ways to design a safer space shut-tle in which, even if the engines failed orcaught tire on takeoff or landing. thecrew might emerge un!>Cathed.

They began working with ·'duetedfan technology" - the internal rotorr.Metreveli was 10 U!>Con his Eagle. Huttheir research was ne~'er completed, be-cau~oflack offunds.

That shortage of resources was oneof the factors behind the engineer's dc-cision to leave for Israel in 1993; thatand the fact, he says, that he felt he'd be"at home" here. (Ilis mother is Jewish,his lather nol.) Because he'd been givenhigh security e1eamnee to work on theRussian space program, and eXpl-'Ch:dhe'd be barred from leaving the countryifhe publici/ed his exit plans, ·'ljust leftwork one day, and never went back."

It hasn't been Israel all the way sincethen, howcver. Metreveli spent 1996-7working for Boeing in Washingtonstate, tOcusing on a design for the 767airliner. Remembering the aborted safcrspace shuttle idea, he pitched it to lJot.....ing as a revolutionary feature, golnowhere, and so began bombardingNASA with proposals - again, to noavail. "'Nothing if not determined, hethen began writing to President Clinton,"on the first or"cach month:' After sixIettcrs, the White House broke, he wasinvited to detail his idca toa room full of"presidential sl-'Curily people," who pro-fessed interest... and rcfcrrcd him backto NASA, This time, he got to give aslide-show, but nothing morc.

Back in Israel since 1997, he's beengiving much of his free time to theproject. "Now, though, I kcl a newurgency. I always believed there was areal need for this kind of craft. Unfor-tunately, it's taken September II to con-vince others ofthat need too." •

COVER STORY SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

gas attacks and to that end the memberstaught themselves engineering. Even nowthey sound firmly un-businesslike. "Wewould love to see more competitors on themarket," says Albrecht Fuchs, now thehead of the Christian group in Zikhron,"because it would mean more people areprotected from poison gas."

Shimoni, an Israeli Jew, proudly addsthat Rainbow's $870 price has not in-creased despite the overwhelming demand."It would be immoral of us to raise it now,"he says.

Neutralizing Deadly GasesIf gas masks and filtration systems ar~ thefirst line of defense against chemical and

PRIZED EXPERTISE:Well-trained guards are just one elementin a complex security system

biological attacks, Israel has also devel-oped a second line to contain the damageinflicted by deadly mustard gas: iodine.

Introduced by the Germans in WorldWar I and employed by Iraq against Iran inthe 1980s, easy-to-make mustard gas caus-es hand-sized blisters, ravages the respi-ratory tract and internal organs, and cancause blindness or death. No one is certainthat terror groups are working on using thegas, but that doesn't eliminate the fears.

In 1997 Hebrew University physiolo-gist Uri Wormser found that povidone io-dine antiseptic - the kind commonlyfound in pharmacies - was useful in lim-iting skin damage due to chemical bum, butthat it had to be applied within 20 minutesof exposure to mustard gas and it didn'tpenetrate the skin deep enough to utilize itsfull neutralizing power. Wormser and Ben-

38

Gurion University pharmaceutical re-searcher Amnon Sintov altered the formulaslightly. When the new iodine mix was ap-plied to the mustard gas bum within 15minutes of exposure, skin damage was re-duced by 50 percent.

Sintov says the research is basicallymilitary-focused with grants from the U.S.and Israeli armies, but there's also beencivilian interest since September II. "I seethis product being developed into a spray,"he says. ':~ight now, there's nothing like itout there.

As for gases like sarin that attack thenervous system, an Israeli adaptation ofcannabis can be used to counteract thedeadly effects. Dexanabinol, a mirror-

MOSHESHAI

image of the THC molecule found incannabis, is being marketed by theRehovot-based Pharmos drug company tohelp repair nerve damage in accident vic-tims. But, Pharmos CEO Haim Aviv pointsout, "whether it's from a car accident or aVX nerve gas attack, brain damage is braindamage." And Dexanabinol, Aviv main-tains, is more effective than the atropinechemical commonly used to fight nervegas, without some of atropine's traumaticside effects.

Not only air can be poisoned. Protectingwater reservoirs represents a new challengefor Magal Security Systems, which bills it-self as a world leader in perimeter securitysystems. Another developing field is pro-tecting oil tank "farms" from attempts todetonate them. Officials in the U.S. havesuddenly discovered that sensitive instal-lations have had inadequate security, andhave come looking for solutions, says Ma-gal head Even-Ezra. "Nuclear plants havealways been safe, and the Americans start-

THE JERUSALEM REPORT DECEMBER 17, 2001

ed guarding their public buildings in 1995,after the bombing ofthe federal building inOklahoma City," Even-Ezra says. "But wa-ter reservoirs? Hardly anything at all." For-eign buyers have already been in contact.

Ready for an EmergencyIn addition to immediate protection againstnoxious fumes, spores and bacteria, escapehas also become a priority. Just a day afterthe Twin Towers attack, Anatoly Cohen ofApco Aviation received an e-mail from aclient in Michigan, with specifications for asmall escape parachute he wanted to selland a request to fill the order quickly. Ittook three weeks for the staff of Caesarea-based Apco, a producer of air-leisureequipment including paragliders and sportparachutes, to design, produce and deliverthe first shipment of the special chute, de-signed so that people who'd neverparachuted before could jump from tallbuildings. Such a device might have savedpeople in the Trade Center who weretrapped on the floors above where theplanes hit.

The product is now being marketed asthe ExeChute, with a price tag of$350. TheExeChute's main selling-point is its super-fast deployment; Cohen says it "opens afteronly 30 meters of free-fall, and you don'tever have to have parachuted to use it."That means anyone trapped 30 floors orhigher in a skyscraper could use one.

The client - who has been selling Ap-co's line of products for years - told Co-hen that he has received hundreds of ordersfor the compact chute, and anticipatesthousands more. Cohen takes no credit."It's his decision, all we did here was fillthe order according to his specifications. Totell the truth, I'm not sure that I would havejumped into the business on my own. Butthere appears to be a demand for this kindof product."

Avi Bachar, founder and head of Is-rateam, a professional crisis-managementconsultancy firm, doubts many peoplewould ever be desperate enough to leap outof tall buildings. A reserve colonel whowas formerly the chief administrative of-ficer ofthe Israeli army's Home Front com-mand, Bachar says he has an alternative inPhree - for Personal High-Rise Emergen-cy Evacuator. The device consists of a seat-like cradle attached to a 400-foot rope de-signed to lower users to the ground fromashigh as 40 floors up in case of emergency.

The box containing the device - andthe winch which unwinds the ropeslowly,smoothly and safely, Bachar says- is un-obtrusively pre-attached to the wall of ahome or office, where it's no more con-spicuous than an air-conditioningunit. "It's

Israel is the only country in the worldthat has made serious preparationsfor NBC attacks

not quite as simple as it looks," saysBachar, "and the secret is in the braking.This works for anyone, from a full-sizedadultto a small child."

Several of Israteam's recent overseascustomers have seen theproduct, and expressed inter-est in marketing it in the U.S.on a joint-venture basis,Bacharreports.

Bachar has also lookedintoa motorized scaffolding,which runs up the side of abuilding on a metal rail. Hesays the product has beentested during the construc-tion stage of an apartment house in Ash-dod, but had to be taken down because itdidn't comply, for now, with Israeli build-ingcodes.

What is perhaps the ultimate building-rescue device, though, is a few years frompotential customers. It's the Eagle, apropeller-driven craft capable of risingstraight up into the air from the ground andhovering in mid-air to pick up as many as10 stranded victims from high buildings ornarrow-walled canyons. Space scientistDavid Metreveli of Ashdod, who onceworked on the Soviet manned-flight pro-

gram, has developed a small-scale proto-type of the sci-fi vehicle; with an invest-ment of $1 million a year for five years,Metreveli says he can have the Eagle flyingand on the market (see box, page 37).

September II, sadly, may have created justthe interest he needs.

What Israelis Know BestIn the long run, perhaps the most signif-icant contribution Israel can offer in the se-curity battle against global terror may beexpertise.

With September II showing just howvulnerable airports and planes can be,Israel's reputation for air security is nowextremely prized. For example, Rafi Ron,former head of security at Ben-Gurion Air-port, has been hired as a special adviser at

Boston's Logan Airport. And foreign in-terest has prompted Shlomo Dror, an ex-EIAI European security chief, to recruit for-mer top officials in the Mossad, the ShinBet security services, and the former com-

mander ofthe Golani Brigade to join him atNew World Security, founded at an invest-ment of about $40 million. Similarly, YoelFeldschu, the ex-CEO of EI AI, has puttogether Ganden, a consultancy firm, tohelp meet U.S. needs, working with YisraelBen-Haim, ex-head of Ben-Gurion Air-port, and former Civil Aviation Authoritydirector Avner Yarkoni.

Info-Files Ltd., which deals in businessintelligence and VIP protection, is on theverge of signing a joint-venture deal with"a subsidiary of a major American lawfirm" to market security solutions for major

9. Buy Israeli stocks on the NYSE or NASDAQ.

8. Suggest to Jewish organizations that theydevelop a "Buy Israeli Products" program.

6. Urge your friends in the high-tech fieldto set up a facility in Israel to upsize theircompanies. #.

7. Suggest to managers of local retailstores to buy Israeli products for resaleand develop a "Buy Israeli Poducts" week.

What Can I Do Today To,Help Israel Meet Its Crisis?Dear Friends:

We in CEGI are calling on Jews worldwide to assist Israel in its present crisis.We suggest that you:

1. Visit Israel. Meet Israel's corporate 5. License your technology to an Israeliexecutives and enter into business company.relationships with them.2. Subcontract the manufacturing ofproducts in Israel; conduct R&D;buy Israeli products; market Israeli products.Contact: Israel Investment PromotionCenter, Fax: 972-2-622-2412,or your American-Israel Chamber ofCommerce.3. Develop software in Israel.Contact: Israeli Association of SoftwareHouses, Fax: 972-3-516-1003.4. Find new technology in Israel.Contact: Israel Investment Promotion Center.

Very truly yours,Elmer L. Vinter, Chairman

Committee for Economic Growth of Israel (nonprofit)5301 North Ironwood Road, Milwaukee, WI 53217, USA

THE JERUSALEM REPORT DECEMBER 17,2001 39

COVER STORY SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

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credibly costly investment, running into thebillions of dollars.

Other forms of expertise are available inIsrael, but some of the people who couldmarket them wonder whether America iswilling to allocate the government re-sources needed to make the best use oftheirknowledge.

"Israel is the only country in the worldthat has made serious preparations for NBCattacks," says Bachar. But the U.S. gov-ernment is unlikely to purchase fulldosages of antibiotics for every one of itsalmost 300 million citizens, as Israel hasfor its 6 million-plus. Or buy that many gasmasks. The U.S.'s entire stockpile of anti-anthrax antibiotics, as a matter of fact, isonly enough to treat 18 million people for60 days.

Some U.S. stockpiles are bigger. Lastsummer, Bachar discloses, U.S. civil de-fense authorities conducted Dark Winter,an exercise simulating a smallpox outbreakin a few key states. "When members ofCongress saw the results of the exercise-which took six hours to run, but depictedwhat would take place over a period of afew weeks - they went to the WhiteHouse. As a result, the U.S. governmentordered 300 million doses of smallpox vac-cine," Bachar says.

But such federal actions are limited, andlikely to stay so - which could well meanan upsurge in interest for Israeli companiesselling instructional videos, special coursesand handbooks for individual citizens onprotecting themselves. "American author-ities talk about the threat of chemical andbiological attack, and even say it's going tohappen," Bachar notes. "But there's not aword, hardly, to prepare the citizen on howto react.

"Look at anthrax. They say what not todo, not to take Cipro. But there's hasn't beena word on how to defend yourself, or yourfamily, or how to prepare a protective spacewhere you can be relatively safe againstchemical or biological attack," he says.

"A population that does not know whatto do has only one recourse: panic," he ob-serves. "And unless they're prepared youcan be sure that ifthere is, say, a gas attack,more people will die as a result of the panicthan ofthe gas itself."

Down the decades, Israel has had to im-provise and innovate to try and minimizethat panic. In the grim post-September IIreality, the protective gear, e~cape tools, se-curity fences and defense ~ills it has de-veloped are proving increasingly sought af·ter by targets of terror in the United Statesand around the world. •

With reporting by figal Schleiferin New York

weeks to several months. For overseas stu-dents, who have to be housed and fed aswell as instructed, the bill would be sub-stantially higher. Before September IIabout one-fourth of the students were fromabroad; the company says that proportionhas increased since, though it declines togive an exact number.

Well-trained guards are just one part of acomplex security system that might includecombinations of "smart" fences, sensorsand closed-circuit TV cameras. But theyare necessary, Magal's Even-Ezra admits,because fences cannot possibly offer acomplete solution.

"There are 110major U.S. airports, andover 100 of them don't have proper perim-eter protection," he says. 'The Americanshave put hundreds of millions of dollarsinto systems that search passengers andluggage for bombs and other weapons, butwho's to prevent someone from walkingonto almost any airport in the world,putting on (1.blue coverall- or a white one,if it happens to be in Switzerland - andtaping an altimeter-detonated bomb to thebottom ofa plane's wing, or its tail?" Prop-erly restricting entry to th~ territory of the100-odd inadequately guarded Americanairports, Even-Ezra says, would be an in-

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U.S. installations, says company headBentzion Magal. His firm will provide thesecurity know-how. While Israelis have of-fered such services abroad in the past, de-mand has expanded drastically in recentweeks.

"Airport security is like nothing else,"says Isaac Levy, a former Shin Bet securitydivision head who's now VP/operations forthe Sherutey Hashomrim Group, whichprovides consultancy and guard trainingfor a variety of government institutions andprivate firms. "For example, 400 grams ofRDX plastic explosive can destroy an air-borne plane with 400 passengers. On theground, it would only hurt people unlu~kyenough to be very close when it went off."

At any given time the school run byLevy's Herzliyah firm has about 1,200 stu-dents, mostly Israelis who guard "uncom-plicated installations." For higher-profilejobs, he prefers veterans of elite combatunits such as the paratroopers or the in-telligence services.

Levy doesn't discuss fees, but ZeevGefen, who runs the Israeli College for Se-curity Investigations of Petah Tikvah, sayshe charges Israeli would-be private inves-tigators and security men "from $2,500 to$6,000" for courses that range from a few

40 THE JERUSALEM REPORT DECEMBER 17, 2001