MKs Examine Bringing Self-Driving Cars to Israel

An interministerial committee will examine Israel’s readiness to adopt driverless-car technology.

In a statement, the Transport Ministry said that it sought to “synergetically design a strategy to prepare for the emergence of self-driving car technology.”

The Ministry recently held its first-ever symposium on self-driving car technology. The conference was led by Avner Flor, deputy director of the Ministry, and Shai Sofer, the Ministry’s Chief Scientist. Also attending were officials from the Justice, Economy, Energy, and Finance Ministries, as well as tax and government officials.

Speaking at the event, Flor said that institution of new regulations to deal with the self-driving car revolution is a priority for all ministries. In addition, a plan to prepare infrastructure to deal with the “behavior” of automatic cars has to be drawn up.

Also appearing at the event was Amnon Sha’ashu’a, inventor of the MobilEye road safety system, which experts expect to be an integral part of commercial self-driving car technology. Israel, he said, could easily emerge as a center of the self-driving car business. Israel was a world leader in the self-driving car industry, given the country’s leadership role in imaging and other technologies that are key to the development of self-driving vehicle.