Yiftah Shapir

Yiftah Shapir is the head of the INSS Middle East Military Balance project. For more than 10 years he was co-editor of the annual volume Middle East Military Balance, where he was responsible for the quantitative section of the publication. Currently he is in charge of the quantitative military balance section on the INSS website. Mr. Shapir also follows issues of modern military technology, including ballistic missiles, space technology and Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) in the Middle East.

In 1993 Mr. Shapir joined the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies (JCSS) at Tel Aviv University (now incorporated into the INSS), as an associate of the Center's Project on Security and Arms Control under prof. Shai Feldman, where he followed the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the Middle East.

Before joining the JCSS Mr Shapir served as a career officer in the Israeli Air Force (from which he retired as a Lt. Colonel). Mr. Shapir has extensive background in information technology and opreations research. Mr Shapir holds a B.Sc in Physics and Chemistry from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and an MBA from the Recanati Business School at Tel Aviv Universit