The army has been given a stage in American academia from which it can share its worldview effectively, Maj. Oded Hershkovich of the IDF Medical Corps told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday.Hershkovich was one of six members in the IDF delegation that arrived in the US at the end of last month for a major international medical conference hosted by Tufts University in Boston. Delegations of medical experts and students from all over the world, including the Gaza Strip and Iraq, also attended.During the event, the commander of the Medical Corps, Brig.-Gen. Itzik Kreis, received an award for his outstanding humanitarian work and delivered a keynote speech in which he outlined the IDF’s global medical assistance efforts.The conference, which focused this year on global health and security, was an opportunity to share medical knowledge and learn from others, Hershkovich said.“There were first-class lecturers, discussing issues from the human genome, responses to water and starvation crises, and ways to combat violence against women,” he added.The IDF delegation shared experiences from its work during its rescue mission to Haiti following the 2010 earthquake disaster, and received many questions about the Israeli field hospital that provided vital assistance to injured Haitians.“We tried to understand what worked and what went wrong in the international effort for Haiti,” Hershkovich said.“We saw that our mission to Haiti garnered appreciation.”Dialogue with others is easier in such meetings as opposed to political events, Hershkovich said.“The fact that we come from the medical world helped us transmit our view.This was a big advantage,” he added.
