As a professional Israeli soccer player, Yisrael Pilosof used his powerful legs to build a name for himself. His father, Yehuda, built a name for himself with powerful legs made from titanium and carbon fiber. Four years ago, Yisrael left the playing field and joined his father's Rishon LeZion prosthetics workshop, Y.D. Gapim. Together they manufacture precision artificial limbs for Israeli amputees and for clients from Peru, Haiti, Albania, Germany, Kazakhstan, Sri Lanka, Ukraine, Egypt, Jordan - and even the United States. "I know it's strange," Yehuda tells ISRAEL21c. "The US and Germany have the best technology in this field. But the talent of the hands is more important." Yehuda also started out as a star soccer player, advancing to the national team as a teen. But in 1967, his high school principal persuaded him to find a solid career path, and he became an orthopedic technician. "To me, it's an art," he says. He began by fashioning hands, although of the thousands of artificial limbs he's been commissioned to make over the years, the majority are legs. People hear about Yehuda Pilosof from friends and family in Israel, and also from media publicity. In 1999, he was in the headlines for fitting a Jerusalem Arab's donkey with a new leg. The crippled animal would otherwise have been euthanized. Click here for full story | 
