The Israel Navy SEAL unit is the IDF’s most active, burdened with a disproportionately high number of injured and fallen soldiers. Accordingly, the unit has pioneered physical and post-traumatic stress therapies designed to quickly and safely return active-duty SEALs to operational duty. However SEALs are often unable to fully process traumatic experiences until after their service.

Working with expert psychologists, the defense ministry and other unit alumni, we have designed as well as partnered with programs that serve SEAL alumni individually and with their former teams.

Most Israel Navy SEALs remain active reservists until the age of 40. They commit weeks per year to training, and can be called away from college classrooms, offices and family events on a moment’s notice for operational service. We provide numerous programs designed to show our appreciation while supporting the commandos’ morale and readiness as reservists:

As individuals, we provide the commandos with gifts, team-building events and useful clothing and accessories for reserve duty.

As teams, we provide them with the unique Team Journey program culminating in a week-long overnight journey that helps them to process their service experiences and build resilience in their current phase of life. In 2021, we launched SEAL team BBQs in order to strengthen team bonds and provide us an opportunity to update the SEALs on the many programs and services available to them and their families. In the first year, 85 teams registered, ranging in age from 23-to-90-years-old.

We embrace the families of fallen warriors, assigning a personal point-of-contact to each family and hosting special social and memorial events. In the fall of 2020, we launched “Now Me,” a social program for the siblings of fallen warriors, who are not formally recognized as bereaved by the Israeli government. Siblings of fallen SEALs are also eligible for our scholarship program.

We also meet the emergency needs of SEALs and bereaved families, be they social, professional or financial.

Weeks before they complete active-duty, we begin preparing Israel Navy SEALs for life beyond the base with transitional workshops on financial literacy, educational opportunities and possible career paths as well as panels featuring Israel Navy SEAL alumni.

Israel Navy SEALs and Unit support personnel hail from a range of socio-economic backgrounds and, for many, college is a daunting expense. Nevertheless many alumni aspire to attend elite universities and a disproportionate number earn undergraduate and advanced degrees from institutions including Technion, IDC Herzliya, the Weizmann Institute and Ivy League institutions in the U.S. We provide scholarships which SEALs repay with 120 hours of community service annually.

To help further their careers SEALs can apply to our renowned Mentorship program, pairing with a successful professional and participating as part of a cohort in this year-long program that includes extraordinary one-to-one support as well as lectures, guided group projects and therapy.

Israel Navy SEALs as well as former US Navy SEALs launching business ventures can apply to our Version Bravo entrepreneurship accelerator, the world’s first program serving American and Israeli veterans together, featured in Israel21c.

At every stage, we provide a vast professional and personal support network of fellow alumni and friends to help SEALs set and achieve their post-service goals.

During 20 months of grueling training, Israel Navy SEALs must touch key markers with all five fingers of their hand. In addition, the candidates who make it through selection and training are not those who lead the pack on swims, runs and marches but those who push and pull even their slowest teammates to finish. This level of commitment and teamwork becomes engrained, and we provide the SEALs with opportunities to have a transformative impact as volunteers in their life after active service:

The nationally recognized Still Waters program provides SEALs the opportunity to volunteer with injured soldiers from across the IDF in rehabilitative water activities.

Buddy Line pairs trained Israel Navy SEAL volunteers with severely post-traumatic veterans from other IDF units for therapeutic water activities with both tangible objectives and goals around psychological well-being. We offer programs in sailing, in which participants earn a skipper’s license; scuba-diving, in which participants earn diving certification; and in wave-surfing/paddle-boarding. Each leverages our effective one-to-one model.

The Ambassadors program combines introspection, writing and public speaking to help SEAL alumni process and understand their experience, then develop and expertly present their stories in dynamic TED-style talks.

These talks typically feature the Jewish values and moral calculus of the Unit and are presented in Israel and across North America.