What is Kapap?
Kapap is Israeli martial arts. Kapap can be practiced bare-handed and with weapons. Kapap can be practiced by both sexes and all ages.
How did Kapap originate?
Kapap system was developed in the late 30s of the 20th century within Jewish Aliyah camps as part of the preparatory training for their arrival to Palestine. In the historic documents it is known as the British mandate Palestine that afterwards became the state of Israel.
Not so numerous Jewish population in Palestine in that period was exposed to frequent attacks of the few times bigger Arabic population. Jewish community decided to create forces for Haganah defense and the Notrim squad was established from which afterwards first Israeli special units called Nodedot were created.
Upon the outbreak of the Second World War first Israeli official units called Palmach, a striking unit, appeared. The representatives of these units passed Kapap training- an abbreviation of Krav pani el panim what means fight face to face.Kapap syllabus was composed of several segments: martial boxing, wrestling, defense with the stick according to the La Canne system, defense from knife and fire arms, physical drills or fitness training nowadays, diversion techniques, survival, learning foreign languages of the enemies- attending language courses, etc.So the Kapap idea is attached to the Israeli special units and this bond is unbreakable.
First Kapap coaches
Gershon Kopler: judo and jiujitsu instructor who implemented self-defense as part of Kapap training in the Palmach and Haganah.
Yehuda Marcus: chief instructor for physical training and judo and jiujitsu in Palmach, who replaced Gershon Kopler after his death.
Moshe Finkel: fitness training officer in charge of integration of new training typologies in Palmach.
Maishel Horovitz: Palmach official Kapap instructor in charge of the development of system and the short stick fight tactics.
Menashe Harel: contributed to the development of the system of fight with a short stick.
Meir Rabinovitz: knife fight.
Itzhak Stibel: boxing
Modern Kapap
Kapap nowdays was established at the beginning of the 90s of the previous century due to the following group of people: Vice Coronel Chaim Peer, Major (in reserve) Avi Nardia, Sergeant Uri Kaffe and Sergeant Albert Timen.
Nowadays lots of representatives of military, police, and security agencies have Kapap trainings consisting of bare-handed fight, self-defense, fitness, fight with weapons, stick, knife, pistol and other arms, specialized techniques, bodyguard protection, etc.
At the end of 2000 Lt.Colonel (Res) Chaim Peer and Major (Res) Avi Nardia decided to abandon the generic term Krav Maga wishing to renew the old term Kapap - Krav panim el panim and on that occasion they founded the International Kapap Federation with its seat in Israel.
Avi Nardia moved to the USA in 2001 and developed the unique Kapap Combatives system to which we belong too.Read More
