World
Israel Conducting Civil Defense Drills
By Chris Mitchell
CBN News, Jerusalem
March 21, 2007
CBNNews.com -- In Israel, the government is conducting the most intense civil defense exercise in Israel's history.
The two day drill is designed to prepare Israelis for any kind of threat.
Watch to hear Pat Robertson's comments about Israel conducting civil defense drills.
The exercise represents the largest drill of its kind. It incorporates medics, fire departments, more than 130 communities throughout the country, the Israeli army, and the police force.
"Over 5,000 police officers are involved in the two day operation which is 25 percent of the police force," police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said.
Israeli emergency officials began planning for the nationwide drill months ago. It's designed to integrate all the lessons learned from last summer's war with Hezbollah.
"We have concluded since the Lebanese war that we have to put a big emphasis on our training and on our ability and on our reserve forces," IDF spokeswoman Avital Leibovitch said. "That's why the year 2007 was declared the year of going back to training in full capacity."
"The IDF is now in the process of upgrading its preparedness and we now train ourselves more and more," said Ephraim Sneh, Israel's Deputy Defense Minister.
Just weeks ago, the IDF conducted a major training exercise on the Golan Heights. These drills simulated a number of different scenarios, including conventional, non-conventional and even nuclear attacks - something Israelis are worried about with Iran's nuclear program.
"When we wrote the drill, the thought behind the planning of course was the different threats that we're facing as an Israeli country here," Leibovitch said.
"That's why we have a variety of threats that are being trained here such as chemical weapons, biological weapons; different terror attacks in industrial zones; in civilian zones; every kind of scenario that can happen."
For these high school students, the drill seemed a light hearted diversion from school. But as more than a million Israelis learned during last summer's war with Hezbollah, life in Israel can go from a drill to the real thing in a very short time. If war breaks out again, Israeli officials want to be ready.
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