Geri Haim: Advice from a Threat Training Expert
With today’s increasing national security threats, there’s no question that the difference between someone being a statistic versus surviving a traumatic event often is determined by two things: PREVENTION: situational awareness and REACTION: having the skill for how to react properly when the emergency occurs. Most events happen in seconds, versus long, extended periods taking hours. That means a potential victim has only seconds to make the right decision to survive and possibly avoid serious harm. Without training, people often freeze, but those who are trained know how to respond when the moment arrives.
Geri Haim knows response well. With an extensive history in the Israel Defense Forces as well as the General Security Services responsible for Israeli embassy protection, Haim has been no stranger both to personal safety training as well as how to respond under extreme conditions. However, what many folks are unaware of is how much training the IDF/ Security Services personnel also go through with regards to seeing potential threats before they manifest and how to practice personal prevention to reduce one’s own risk of harm.
The Israeli Security Apparatus / System approach follows a very fundamentally different path that typical traditional safety taught in the U.S. Unlike the general safety that is far more prevalent in the country, Israel tends to be far more active with unpredictable events and threats to human life. As a result, all security and many citizens are trained for a heightened sense of security all the time, not just when they happen to be assigned at an airport or specific risk locations.
From Haim’s perspective, even the average person absolutely should be trained to know to look for threats in everyday society as well as to know how to get out of trouble when it begins to occur. That includes predictive monitoring of what’s happening nearby, using offensive attacks for defense, physical positioning for leverage, and physical orientation to message resistance versus weakness. Every person should also know what situational awareness is and how to practice it. At the end of the day, per Geri Haim, the individual is ultimately responsible for his or her own safety in a pinch. It’s practically foolish to always expect someone else will come along to help. In fact, in many cases, people just witness and do nothing to help, even when someone is being harmed in front of them.
Haim Geri
Geri Haim isn’t the only security expert available, but his depth and experiences are rooted in real-life situations and extensive training under fire and real event pressure. Many other experts can’t come close to their level of personal knowledge, and much of their technical knowledge is rooted in books and text only. So, when Haim points out that it is to anyone’s benefit, at any age, to learn how to protect one’s self even in everyday life, we probably should take time to listen a lot better. After all, the nation of Israel has a strong history of teaching its citizens self-defense.
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