When Ofir Drori arrived in Africa in the 1990s, laws against illegal wildlife trafficking were on the books, but there had been virtually no prosecutions.

The corruption that was responsible for the impunity still exists, but thanks to a grassroots activist model that Drori, now 50, established, some 3,000 major traffickers are behind bars.

Born and raised in Tel Aviv, Drori has been hooked on Africa ever since his father told him Tarzan stories as a boy. He was headed for an academic career in the sciences until a pre-army trip to Kenya changed his world.

Abandoning his tourist safari, he set off alone into the bush, got lost and eventually reached a Masai village, where he stayed for 10 days, leaving deeply impressed by the culture and generosity of the people he met.

He returned to the continent after completing compulsory military service in 1998, traveling 650 kilometers (over 400 miles) over two years by camel, horse, canoe and on foot to visit some of Africa’s most remote tribes. He became an activist, a teacher and a photojournalist covering humanitarian issues there.

He credits much of his success to Israeli chutzpah and the ability to think outside the box, as well as IDF officer training that equipped him with skills in management, team building, team motivation, undercover investigations and sting operations.

The Times of Israel spoke with Drori via Zoom from his office in Nairobi, where over the course of a typical workday he might spy butterflies, chameleons, sunbirds and vervet monkeys in the lush vegetation outside his window.

The following interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

The Times of Israel: You began fighting wildlife trafficking after you escaped to Cameroon from Nigeria, where your research for a magazine article on radical Islam put a price on your head. What was your first exposure to the illegal wildlife trade?

Ofir Drori: Jane Goodall had written that apes were on borrowed time because of the illegal trade in chimp and gorilla bushmeat. I thought I’d write about it for an international magazine to raise money for NGOs fighting it. I wrote 20 pages, but I couldn’t finish because there were no heroes and nobody to fundraise for.

It’s said that wildlife trafficking is the third biggest form of global organized crime after drugs and weapons.

Millions of animals, among them elephants, rhinos, pangolins and gorillas, are slaughtered for body parts that are used in Asian medicine and command high prices.........

© The Times of Israel