Krav Maga was created in the 1940s by Imi Lichtenfeld and has long been considered a “secret weapon” of the Israeli armed forces. Imi (Imrich) Sde-Or, born Lichtenfeld, was born on May 26, 1910, in Budapest and raised in Bratislava, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

 

Imi’s father was the chief of the local police department and a respected self-defense instructor. He instilled strict discipline at home and was deeply committed to teaching his son the principles of ethics, strength, and resilience.

 

From a young age, Imi stood out for his athletic talent and passion for combat sports. By the age of 18, he had become a national champion in both boxing and wrestling. But his life took a dramatic turn in the 1930s, when anti-Semitic violence began spreading across Europe. Imi organized and led street defense groups to protect Jewish communities, often facing larger and more heavily armed groups with nothing but skill, strategy, and determination.

 

In 1939, with the situation worsening, Imi made the difficult decision to immigrate to what was then British-controlled Palestine. In 1940, he boarded the Pentcho, a ship crowded with Jewish refugees. During the perilous journey, Imi risked his life repeatedly to rescue passengers who had fallen overboard. His bravery came at a cost, he developed a serious ear infection due to prolonged exposure to seawater. After the shipwrecked off the coast of Greece, Imi was rescued by a British naval patrol and brought to Alexandria, Egypt, where he underwent emergency surgery and recovered.

 

Imi then joined the British Armed Forces, where he served for two years. In 1942, he finally arrived in Israel and began training members of the Hagana, one of the main underground defense organizations that would later form the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). It was during this period that Krav Maga began to take shape, an intuitive, effective, and brutally efficient system of self-defense built on natural reflexes and real-world combat experience.

 

By 1948, with the establishment of the State of Israel, Imi was appointed Chief Instructor of Physical Fitness and Hand-to-Hand Combat for the IDF. He served in this role for over 20 years, developing a system that could be taught quickly and used effectively by soldiers of all backgrounds.

 

After retiring from the military in 1964, Imi opened his first civilian Krav Maga training center in the city of Netanya. His goal was clear: to equip ordinary people, not just soldiers, with the tools to defend themselves and survive violent encounters.

 

Imi Lichtenfeld passed away on January 9, 1998, at the age of 87. His legacy lives on through every Krav Maga practitioner around the world. He left behind not only a revolutionary self-defense system but also a philosophy rooted in courage, integrity, humility, and the unshakable will to survive.