Gun Grabbing Krav Maga
By Moshe Katz
CEO
Israeli Krav International 

August 30, 2019, Israel

I have seen a lot of bad Krav Maga over the years. I have seen a lot of terrible stuff that passes for self defense, things that defy logic. Today I saw a video that rose quickly to the top of the list of what I call, Dangerous Krav Maga that will guarantee to get you killed. 

I will not name the person, the country or the association. My goal is not to mock or offend, but to save lives. 

In this scenario a man wearing pants that say Krav Maga, Special Forces, is being threatened by two criminals. These are men who live a life of crime. Keep that in mind when training. One man has a knife to the Victim's belly, the other has a gun to the side of the neck. The man in the middle clearly cannot deal with both at the same time. 

I will say at least he does not attempt to grab both the knife and the gun at the same time, which I have seen an instructor in South Africa teach. This defies the laws of physics, We continue. 

So this man here uses his shoulder to push the gun a little bit out of the line of fire, that part is OK, not a bad start. But then he proceeds to grab the barrel of the gun and pull it away while stepping backwards. i.e. he grabs the barrel of the gun and simply pulls it forward, one motion. and he does this with his left hand against the criminal's right hand. 

This movement is not likely to work. Why?

It relies upon Speed: He must grab the gun with one hand before the gunman pulls away, there is nothing to stop the gunman from pulling away. (the way we teach this, there IS something stopping the gunman from pulling away). This is a lot of speed to rely upon.

It relies upon Strength: With his left hand he must pull the gun out of the right hand of the street criminal. There is no twisting or turning, simply one hand pulling/Yanking the gun out of another man's hand. This takes a lot of strength, more than most people can count on. When experimenting with this we find that no one will simply let go of the gun. It will be a struggle, and it is a struggle that you will lose because the gunman has his entire body force behind the gun while you are using only arm strength. Simply put your energy is in the wrong direction, again you are going against the laws of physics.

It relies upon Precision: In the heat of the moment the defender must grab the barrel precisely, any slight mistake in this grab will result in no grab, only hurt fingers. This Precision is difficult to achieve in a moment of stress. The way this is done there is no room for error. Anything that relies upon the assumption of no errors will fail. 

The problem with Krav Maga is anyone can make up anything they want and call it Krav Maga. People accept it even if it goes against logic and the laws of physics. These instructors are putting their naïve students in grave danger.

Learn IKI Krav Maga On Line Directly from Israel

Receive daily video clips from Israel directly to your computer or phone. Never be left behind. Do not be caught practicing yesterday's Krav Maga. Stay on the cutting edge of real Krav Maga being developed in Israel and around the world. We currently work in 40 countries world wide and are seeking instructors to learn and spread our system. 

IKI Krav Maga: Easy to learn, Easy to apply, Easy to remember. 

Krav Maga on line

Please note that all fields followed by an asterisk must be filled in.
Google