TORONTO — Israel’s first-hand experiences with terrorism have helped its ally, the United States, according to American bioterror­ism expert Leonard Cole.

Cole, the author of a newly published book, Terror: How Israel Has Coped And What America Can Learn, told a Temple Sinai audience recently that Israel has carved out a niche of expertise in three interrelated fields – communications, hospital drills and terror medicine.

In Israel, security agencies and police and firefighting forces are on the same radio frequency and thus confusion is avoided.

By comparison, the New York City police and fire department used different radio frequencies during the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, causing unnecessary loss of life among these responders.

Since the outbreak of the second Pa­lestinian uprising in 2000, Israeli hospitals have held a major drill at least once a year in anticipation of terrorist assaults.

But in the United States, there are no such regulations, said Cole, an adjunct professor of political science at Rutgers University in Newark, N.J. who also holds degrees in the health sciences, public policy and dental medicine.

Due to the high number of Israelis killed in suicide attacks in the past eight years, doctors in Israel have perfected techniques to deal with multiple penetration wounds.

In the United States, however, trauma surgeons rarely deal with such cases, noted Cole, an advisory board member of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism and a trustee of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Saying that Israelis have proven to be admirably resilient in coping with ter­ror­ism, Cole pointed out that bombed   cafes, for example, are usually back in bus­iness within 36 hours of an attack.

Even during the height of the intifadah, in 2002, 90 per cent of Israelis surveyed by pollsters said they intended to remain in the country.

He ascribed Israeli resilience to two factors: a great sense of community and a feeling that Jews in Israel should re­main in their homeland, come what may.

“The Israelis have backbone,” he observed.

Stewart Bell, a reporter on the staff of the National Post who specializes in  terrorism and has written books on the topic, was the second speaker.

Saying that terrorists no longer practise restraint since they are theologically driven, Bell observed that governments combating terrorism today face two major challenges.

The first is fighting their “poisonous ideology,” while the second is stopping them from translating their “des­truc­tive thoughts” into action.

Terrorists have targeted Canada for three reasons: the Canadian army has joined the battle against the Ta­l­iban in Afghanistan, Canada and the United States are close allies, and Can­ada is home to a fairly large Jewish community.

Though not suggesting that a major terrorist incident is imminent here, Bell warned it is “not out of the question.”

In a brief survey of terrorism in Can­ada, he cited attacks mounted by Sikhs and Armenians and pointed out that the problem of homegrown terrorism has begun to emerge.

Homegrown terrorists regard terror as a legitimate response to grievances, said Bell, whose books include The Martyr’s Oath and Cold Terror.

Some Canadians sup­port terrorism abroad, while terrorists themselves use Canada for purchasing weapons, planning attacks, disseminating propaganda and finding hideouts, he said.

Canadian security services have uncovered terrorist plots, but Canadians should not be complacent about terrorism, Bell said.