Related Article: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1897940
How Israel handles airport security
101–110 of 168 posts
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#102I'm not sure if I'd really feel better when surrounded by armed soldiers and being questioned a couple of times on my way to the plane (also inside the bus that takes me to the airport as I understand) than if I would just have to go through a security gate, eventually take off my shoes and get my baggage scanned by x-ray. I mean, I was a couple of times questioned at the airport, with the usual questions ("did anyon…
The current system in the US strictly follows a flowchart. It has no preparation for anything other than "generic terrorism".
With an infinite set of previously unthought of plans, this is a system terrorists can game to their advantage. The Israeli system requires competent individuals trained to adapt to any scenario.
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#103I cannot believe people bring up Israeli airport security as an example of a system the U.S. should model. The security agents are neither intelligent, nor well trained, nor polite. The entire system is based on racism and I would take TSA security over the Israeli model any day. People were complaining here about a pat down search in public by a TSA agent equaling sexual harassment. I was actually taken to a public bathroom by an El Al agent and strip searched, purely because my last name "sounds Turkish".
From my anecdotal experience, El Al has security personnel that appears trained to a naked eye, but in reality is extremely ineffective, flawed, and unethical. I had the misfortune to go through El Al security four times. These all occurred in a span of two weeks, roughly in the same circumstances (I had to fly into Israel, fly out, fly back in, and fly back out). I can tell you that the outcome of their screening is heavily inconsistent and highly dependent on the prejudices of the particular agent doing the interview, and not necessarily on advanced training procedures.
I had the same answers for their questions every time. Two of the times the agents were Israeli jews who immigrated from Russia. Since we share a common background, both let me pass after very few questions because my trip details seemed perfectly reasonable to them. The other two times, I was interviewed by jews of clearly middle-eastern descent - both had no understanding of my cultural background, and both thought my trip details were extremely suspicious, subjecting me to a detailed search. So the outcome of the interviews was effectively random, which means they might as well perform random searches.
The interviews were highly unethical, inappropriate, and degrading. Even more importantly, they were completely ineffective, resulting in a random outcome highly dependent on each agent's personal prejudices. I don't know what good security looks like, but I can tell you that this most certainly isn't it.
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#104I cannot believe people bring up Israeli airport security as an example of a system the U.S. should model. The security agents are neither intelligent, nor well trained, nor polite. The entire system is based on racism and I would take TSA security over the Israeli model any day. People were complaining here about a pat down search in public by a TSA agent equaling sexual harassment. I was actually taken to a public…
>>I don't know what good security looks like, but I can tell you that this most certainly isn't it.
I don't know much about airport security either.
What I do know is that there exists lots of well financed organizations that want to blow up Israeli airports and airplanes -- with a bad track record during the last few decades.
So something is done right, which might be kept a secret. If not the interviews, what?
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#105Despite the overwhelming possibility of being downvoted it needs mention that the Israeli model as practiced may not be that good an example for US to follow. It has been documented by several respected human rights organizations and UN that Israel's security measures are often used as a proxy for punishment and harassment for disagreeing with the official govt line. In spite of some erosion of liberties in US in the…
Did you even read the article?
Why wouldnt I ? Predictably enough, it seems the downvotes have started ringing in.
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Gestapo me", "BS" - you seem pretty decisive. are you basing your comments on actual knowledge of the process or anecdotal evidence? My personal impression from countless times of passing via TLV is that the profiling is mostly itinerary based. That is, Israeli citizen going off to a 3 day business trip to Europe is less suspect than an American tourist with a very short length of stay. I know a middle aged WASP lad…
As another anecdote, I was questioned heavily going into Israel for the Birthright program (flying out of Miami on El Al). They actually confiscated my Nintendo DS because I didn't have a game to play for it in my bag. I also got a full physical pat down in a back office. That said, the people were truly polite. If TSA employees were more tactful and friendly, that unpleasant potion might at least go down a little ea…
As far as i remember from another article. TSA personal is trained to be unfriendly, mainly to push you out of your comfort zone and see how you react to this kind of treatment.
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Gestapo me", "BS" - you seem pretty decisive. are you basing your comments on actual knowledge of the process or anecdotal evidence? My personal impression from countless times of passing via TLV is that the profiling is mostly itinerary based. That is, Israeli citizen going off to a 3 day business trip to Europe is less suspect than an American tourist with a very short length of stay. I know a middle aged WASP lad…
As another anecdote, I was questioned heavily going into Israel for the Birthright program (flying out of Miami on El Al). They actually confiscated my Nintendo DS because I didn't have a game to play for it in my bag. I also got a full physical pat down in a back office. That said, the people were truly polite. If TSA employees were more tactful and friendly, that unpleasant potion might at least go down a little ea…
How was the pat-down compared to what the TSA has started doing? More or less thorough?
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
As another anecdote, I was questioned heavily going into Israel for the Birthright program (flying out of Miami on El Al). They actually confiscated my Nintendo DS because I didn't have a game to play for it in my bag. I also got a full physical pat down in a back office. That said, the people were truly polite. If TSA employees were more tactful and friendly, that unpleasant potion might at least go down a little ea…
How was the pat-down compared to what the TSA has started doing? More or less thorough?
As thorough I'd say.
I don't think they really suspected me of anything, as a white Jewish kid, but I'm not very religious and maybe my answers to their religious questions while claiming Judaism as a religion was a red flag.
Re: How Israel handles airport security
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can I ask how are you comparing costs here? 76 dollars per passenger is an obscene amount of money: look at the dollar totals. In terms of lives saved, the TSA is already a gigantic waste of money. You could save a lot more lives per dollar by doing hundreds of other different things.
$77 per passenger is a huge amount, especially compared to the cost of a cheap domestic flight. But what is the hidden cost of the clusterfuck that American airports are becoming? I would gladly pay an extra $38 per flight if it meant going through a sane, competent, and, if not pleasant, at least not overtly hostile system.
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Re: How Israel handles airport security
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
Uh, soldiers are paid. And airport security work is not by soldiers anyway, it's regular employment.
Forced labor wages As for airport security not being done by soldiers, my mistake. I only visited Israel once, but I was under the impression the airport guys were IDF. I guess I'm misremembering the uniforms. Thanks for the correction.
There probably were soldiers there too, so you are probably remembering them.
As for the wages for soldiers, the soldiers actually get a lot of economic benefit from it. People with previous military experience are far more desirable to employers, and there is a very large income boost from it. You can think of it as a form of internship.