Israeli Military to Use Neck Armor to Protect Against Arab Throat-Slashing

At least 100 incidences of reported knife attacks have been carried out by Palestinians and Arabs against Israeli military and civilians in the past couple of months. The Israeli military has finally announced a solution to keeping its troops safe from having their necks slashed: neck protectors.

The Israel Defence Force’s (IDF) Central Command first pondered giving the neck protectors to soldiers in dangerous areas in November, the Times of Israel reported. Lieutenant Colonel Liron Segel, head of the Personal Protection and Equipment Department, said the neck armor is designed to fit under various types of protective vests so every soldier can use it and be effectively and comfortably protected.

“On the one hand we put an emphasis on materials that are very durable in order to protect against a penetrating wound, while on the other hand we worried about comfort,” Segel said. “We have managed to make a product that is flexible, thin and even its weight on your neck is not comparatively that heavy.”

Segel did not go into detail about how the neck guards were designed or which companies producing body armor for the IDF received the contract for producing the new neck piece, but he specified that it would be made in Israel.

Major Guy Elazar of the IDF’s counter-terrorism unit, however, explained to the IDF magazine Bamahane that “the inner part of the protector is gentle to the touch, the external section is made of half-rigid plastic, which is low and wide so as to defend the connection between the neck and the shoulder blade.”

The IDF provided the following images for how the gear would look together with the full protective vest:

The new gear has already been distributed for testing and will soon be sent out to IDF units operating in areas of Israel where knife attacks are most common. Approximately 850 protective neck guards will be passed out to troops by the end of this month.

Israel’s Arutz Sheva reports that the gear will be used “mostly to combat soldiers stationed at checkpoints and roadblocks in Judea and Samaria.” The IDF announced that combat soldiers are only to use the neck gear during their routine security missions.