Shihan Eli Bitran

Shihan Eli Bitran was born in Israel in the year 1954. He started in the art of Self-Defense, in a period, which there was no knowledge of Martial Arts in Israel, at that time in Israel; there were a few clubs of Self-Defense and Judo. In the year 1972 Shihan Eli Bitran started to practice in a professional way the Karate method of kyukoshinkai, which Gidon Kadari led in Israel. After a period of intense activity he left in 1975 to practice for Sho-Dan in the main school of the method in Tokyo Japan, in that period of time he participated in the first Kyukoshinkai world tournament in Tokyo Japan and that is still going on every 4 years. That tournament was like a Karate Olympics since the Karate is not known as an Olympic sport. In addition of that he completed his studies in Thailand Boxing, which he started to apply in Israel in the year 1978.

After a period of activity in the method, Shihan Eli Bitran decided to stop the activity of Thailand Boxing, because it is a sport that exposes the student in the fighting ring without teaching method as in the other methods. The political influence from the Arab excommunication (Arab countries announced that if Israel participated in tournaments, they won’t) was felt in Israel in all the branches and of course in Karate. Israel was banned from the international Karate association and Kyukoshinkai. At the same period it was rough for students to move on and participate in tournaments.

In the year 1981 Shihan Eli Bitran went out in a frame of an Israeli team to the European Karate Tournament in Oko (an international tournament) the tournament was also in full contact even though we didn't win any first places we were honored for our fighting spirit. After a long period of conflict thinking because of the inability to move forward in Kyukoshinkai Shihan Eli Bitran decided to quit. In 1990 he sent a letter to the founder of the method Masotazi Oyama and informed him about the disconnection between the Israeli organization and the Japanese one. Shihan Eli Bitran decided to move on to learn a new method, "Seido", which was built by the master Kaicho Tadashi Nakamura that was one of the seniors in Kyukoshinkai and left it for political reasons and personal ones. After exchanging a few letters Shihan Eli Bitran left out in July 1990 to the United States to complete lessons in the central school for Seido, "Honbu", that is located in New York. He started his training as a white belt as all beginners, but his progress was fast by his skills. After a period of hard training and after he showed excellent skills and tested by Kaicho Tadashi Nakamura, Kaicho raised him to Dan 4, and maid him the president of the method in Israel, the Martial Arts school in Israel which Shihan Eli Bitran runs brings his students to excellence and achievements.