Eli Beer

Nominated by a committee chaired by H.M. Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan for his efforts to create a multicultural, apolitical medical rescue organization, Beer was chosen to become one of the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders in 2012. Young Global Leaders come from 65 countries and are honored for their outstanding leadership, professional accomplishments and commitment to society.

Beer's vision is to bring United Hatzalah's life-saving model to other communities across the world. In 2015, he expanded internationally with the establishment of branches in South America and other countries, including "United Rescue" in Jersey City, US, where the response time was reduced to just two minutes and thirty-five seconds.

Beer was invited to be a speaker on April 2013 on TEDMED, an annual conference about health and medicine. His talk was later featured on the TED website.

Beer received the Presidential Award for Volunteerism from Shimon Peres, the President of the State of Israel in 2011. The award is given to individuals and groups whose volunteering effort is deemed to be outstanding in a given year by a committee. Twelve awardees are chosen each year.

Beer received the Social Entrepreneur Award from the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship in cooperation with the World Economic Forum of Davos in 2010. The award is given to those driving social innovation and transformation in various fields including education, health, environment and enterprise development.

United Hatzalah established its reputation as an EMS organization by being at the forefront of medical innovation. It was the first EMS to introduce the Ambucycle, a motorcycle equipped with all the medical equipment of an ambulance aside from a stretcher, which allowed its volunteer first responders to reach the patient on average of 3 minutes across Israel, 8 to 15 minutes ahead of the first ambulance. In 2008, United Hatzalah launched Israel's first GPS-based dispatch system, which was able to locate and dispatch the five closest EMS responders within 3 seconds of the emergency.

In 2006 Beer changed the name of the organization to United Hatzalah to represent the partnership of Jewish, Muslim, Druze and Christian volunteers from all religious spectrums working together in order to save lives.

Beer began to work with Hatzalah Jerusalem in 1992. With him as fundraiser and operational coordinator the organization grew and changed its name to Hatzalah Israel reflecting its nationwide scope. Hatzalah Israel acted as an umbrella organization, incorporating many Hatzalah chapters that had been established throughout the country.

On June 2, 1978, Beer witnessed the bombing of the #12 bus. He was struck by the chaos of the incident and the dearth of emergency rescue resources. This traumatic experience inspired him to volunteer on an ambulance at the age of 15, while attending school and working in his family’s book and real estate business.

Eli Beer (born September 13, 1973 in Israel) is the founder of United Hatzalah of Israel, and President of the U.S.-based organization Friends of United Hatzalah. United Hatzalah of Israel is an independent, non-profit, fully-volunteer emergency medical services organization that provides fast and free emergency medical first response throughout Israel.