Airport 'Israelification': Close Up. Personal

Canada's The Star.com has what strikes me as one of the clearest explanations of why no plane has ever been hijacked, let alone blown up, flying out of Israel.

'It is mindboggling for us Israelis to look at what happens in North America, because we went through this 50 years ago,' said Rafi Sela, the president of AR Challenges, a global transportation security consultancy. He's worked with the RCMP, the U.S. Navy Seals and airports around the world.

Here's what Flight 253 would-be bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab would have faced had he flown out of Ben-Gurion International Airport:

"'Israelis, unlike Canadians and Americans, don't take s--- from anybody. When the security agency in Israel (the ISA) started to tighten security and we had to wait in line for — not for hours — but 30 or 40 minutes, all hell broke loose here. We said, 'We're not going to do this. You're going to find a way that will take care of security without touching the efficiency of the airport.''

"That, in a nutshell is 'Israelification' - a system that protects life and limb without annoying you to death."

Read the rest.

I know this from personal experience: on my last flight in mid December - barring hanging out at the coffee shop - it took me under half an hour to go from parking lot to departure lounge.