h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

In Israel, going from a busy lane to a less busy lane (which everybody does, because of the famous Israeli impatiens) is an impossible mission. It combines the New-Yorker problem- Indicating lights indicate to the cars in the other lane to block your path from getting in front of them- and the Taiwanese problem- If the open space is longer than 1 car length, you should be aware also from the cars behind you in your lane, who will try to acheive 2 goals at once: changing to the less busy lane and preventing you from doing so. The last manouver will be done by pushing the gas pedal to its maximum while changing lanes in order to shorten the time left for you to manouver. In many cases, the driver behind you also runs away from the driver behind him, which means he drives even faster.

The only polite thing that Israelis do on the road is warning each other from the traffic police. This is done by "blinking" with the lights to the traffic in the opposite directio. However, if the driver opposite to you does this, it's not neccesarily for that purpose. He might be trying to tell a slower driver on the left lane to move to the right and make him place to take over. Usually, he won't care if the other driver is taking over a truck and his only option to make way is to hit the truck.

Mentioning the traffic police...
Don't be mistaken by the unlawful Israeli driving. It's not because they don't get caught (in fact, Israeli tend to brag on the traffic offences the were convicted for). The Israeli trafic police is rather effective and you should know the ways how to avoid it:
1. Be aware to cars "blinking" to you from the opposite direction (as ab.)
2. As the legal speed in Israel as 90 KPH, don't drive over 120. This is helpful for 2 reasons: (a) There will be alwas sombody near you that will drive faster; (b) As the traffic police believes that deterring is better than punishment, you will have enough time to respond while seeing them from far.
3. Put yourself behind a police car. Regular police in Israel gives s**t about the way you drive, and probably will drive faster and worse than you.
4. Hit the policeman. It happens a lot, and you will probably end with an accusation a bit severer (of course, that's not seriously recommended). The true best way to get with the least punishment is saying "You're right, Mister, it happens"- Israelis, including policemen, are very nice when they are not in a hurry, and you might even be forgiven.

Car Accidents:
While driving in Israel be very aware: this traffic accidents in this country are a national priority issue since being so common.
It is very recommended to try to avoid driving on the night between Friday and Saturday after midnight because of the combination of the following factors:
1. The legal age for getting a license in Israel is 17.5
2. At the age of 18 Israelis are mandatorily recruited to the army and have small chances to get driving experience during that period.
3. Only at weekends, they get a weekend vacation.
4. Israeli hang-out habbits dictate all parties start after mid-night and end around 5:00 AM. Some people tend to be tired on this hours (even without having their sleep denied during the week because of military duties).
5. Muslem people are denied from drinking alcohol, Jews don't.
Not to speak about the psychological effects of being in the army on their wrecklessness, their self confidence and their need to brag, you can see the picture by now.

Most important: If you are involved in a car accident, don't get angry on the other side. Some will try to frighten you, some will go further.