History
Krav Maga — "contact combat" in Hebrew — was developed by Imi Lichtenfeld, a boxer and wrestler from Bratislava who used his skills in the 1930s to defend the Jewish quarter against fascist gangs. He fled Europe in 1940 and reached Palestine in the early 1940s.
From 1948 Lichtenfeld was chief instructor of physical fitness and Krav Maga in the Israel Defense Forces. After leaving the army in the 1960s he adapted the system for civilians, police and women's self-defence. Today several international organisations teach it.