When he was teaching me to shoot, the Old Man used to caution against relying overly much on mechanical safeties on a gun. "Remember," he told me, "The only safety you can always rely on is the one between your ears." Some years later, when I left my rather idyllic and peaceful northeast Iowa home and started living in locales with higher crime rates, I discovered a corollary to that rule; "Don't rely overly much on law enforcement or civil authorities. The only hands that you should rely on to provide security for yourself, your family, and your community, are your own."

Rabbi Yossi Eilfort has taken that same maxim to heart.

Gun ownership in California’s Jewish community is spiking as Jews take self-defense into their own hands while the war in Israel continues raging, according to a rabbi who trains the community on gun safety. 

"Magen Am’s mission is to train and empower the community to deter and respond to security threats. We're trying to give everybody the tool to be empowered to protect themselves," Los Angeles-based Rabbi Yossi Eilfort said in a video produced by the NRA exclusively obtained by Fox News Digital. 

Eilfort is an NRA instructor and founder of Magen Am USA, the only Jewish, nonprofit organization licensed on the West Coast to provide armed security services.

Earlier this month I wrote on how armed Jews would be a jihadi scumbag's worst nightmare, and I'm heartened to see Rabbi Eilfort not only agreeing but taking steps to ensure that this is the case in Los Angeles. Granted the locale causes some problems, both legally and logistically, as California is notoriously averse to armed self-defense and shooting ranges are few and far between. These are problems, though, that can and should be overcome.

Rabbi Eilfort's group, it's important to note, teaches other things besides safe and effective use of firearms.

Magen Am, which operates in LA as well as Phoenix, trains volunteers and community members in extensive classes on gun safety, hand-to-hand self-defense, de-escalation, verbal tactics and the use of intermediate weapons such as Tasers or batons.

The entire self-defense issue has escalated considerably for American Jewish communities since the Oct 7th atrocities, but the decline of our major cities means that it's already a problem for all of the people in these locales. More and more, people are doing the right thing; taking responsibility for their safety and security. Armed citizens deter crimes hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of times each year, and as our cities continue to decline and decay, that number is only likely to rise.

We citizens can't always rely on the authorities. Given events in our major cities of late, that is now just more obvious than ever. We citizens can and should, however, always rely on ourselves. That's the good Rabbi's message. Another well-known firearms instructor, Colonel Jeff Cooper, said it best:

“If violent crime is to be curbed, it is only the intended victim who can do it. The felon does not fear the police, and he fears neither judge nor jury. Therefore what he must be taught is to fear is his victim.”

Rabbi Eilfort should be lauded far and wide. He is doing his part to ensure that the safety of the Jewish community in Phoenix and Los Angeles is in the right hands - their own.