Does anybody know which IDF Merkava units have female crews? All I can find is that they are assigned to the Southern Command. I’m building a Merkava 4 and plan on it having all-female crew figures.
Thanks,
Mike
Female tank crews only serve in 460 Brigade, which is IDF’s main armored training formation based in Shizafon in the southern Negev. Those soldiers are all instructors, no female tankers serve in operational units.
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Interesting, is there a reason for that?
According to this article, full crews were deployed at the end of 2017.
https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5047996,00.html
Of course, I have read other articles where the military seems to be going back and forth about woman tankers since at least 2015. I have read they do not want mixed crews.
I would have modeled the Swedish STRV 103 so I could put in the all female Swedish Bikini Team of old. Keeping it a purely military theme of course. 
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The IDF was always ambivalent about the idea of having female tankers. On one hand, there’s a lot internal pressure coming from female soldiers to allow them to serve in the Armored Corps as tankers; on the other, the IDF seems to think that the complications involved greatly outweigh the benefits. The major obstacle hands down is the (very vocal) opposition coming from religious soldiers and officers: these would under no circumstances agree to serve in coed tank units. Religious soldiers (especially junior officers) serve in the IDF in much greater numbers than their percentage in the general population, so the IDF simply chooses not to confront them. Unfortunately, this is the general tendency in the IDF these days. It isn’t about the the idea of female tankers, but female soldiers generally serving on the same base with religious ones.
Thanks for the information. When the coed tankers discussions happen over here, it is often cited that the IDF can do it, why not us. The nuance of instructor only vs front line is never brought up. Could be folks don’t know.
I am more of the thought, develop a real standard for tankers. If you can pass, then you are a tanker. If not than you are not no matter the sex.
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The article is from over two years ago stating
Not really. The article says ‘female soldiers WILL BE stationed on Israel’s peaceful borders and WILL NOT join the fighting IDF tank brigades’ and ‘for the first time a female tank unit will patrol the border’. That was the plan anyway, but the IDF since doubled back.
As for the article, Ynet is a notoriously unreliable source. First of all, tanks don’t ‘patrol’ the Egyptian and Jordanian borders (these are 208 and 307 km long, respectively) but being deployed in certain stationary positions on the Egyptian border in the vicinity of Shizafon as part of their training rather than because of operational needs.
13 of the 15 female soldiers started the course finished it. All but four, who were later qualified as TCs, were sent to serve in other units (mostly the 33rd ‘Caracal’ coed Infantry Battalion). As for the TCs, none were given actual command of a tank. Two of the four later appealed to the Supreme Court to allow female soldiers to serve as tankers.
In early 2019 the IDF decided that the project, although generally regarded as successful, will be cancelled.
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Hear, hear!!
Ken.
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That was the mindset when I was aircrew. Female pilots were brought in during the 80’s. I was of the adage that if you qualified, no matter the sex, then you earned the right for us, yes, us, to stand together, to stand upon the ground we swore to defend…together, equally! Screw this diversity, unity crap. The US Military was light years ahead of everyone in that department! 
Funny, as there were never such operational crews in the IDF. While female tank instructors (gunners, loaders and drivers) have been around for at least three decades, they were never trained to work together as an operational crew. As for TCs, only four were ever qualified, but as said, none were assigned to command tanks operationally.
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I agree. This is how it should work.
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Bummer. Guess I’ll model what could (should) have been.
You might want to give that a second thought. During WW2 women served in the Red Army as snipers, pilots, tankers and what not. The US Military at the same time kept African American soldiers in segregated units and black nurses were only allowed to treat black soldiers. The fact that many of the top military commanders came from southern states probably had a lot to do with that…
If you can pass the training, no problem. But don’t lower the standards which seems to be what happened with the Ranger School thing here in the US.
Rich
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And a lot of other schools, and PT standards in general.
Ken.
22 years as a Veteran, I stand by my statement. It is generic enough for most to understand that our country, with all it’s faults, is still the country most seek to come to. I see/hear no one illegally entering North Korea in comparison.