In a response to a High Court petition, the Israel Defense Forces said Monday that it was delaying a planned pilot program for female soldiers to serve in the Armored Corps.

Currently, female soldiers can serve in tanks in the IDF’s Border Defense Corps, as part of an all-female tank company in the Caracal mixed-gender light infantry battalion, which operates along the Egyptian border — not in wars or in fighting deep behind enemy lines.

The program in the Armored Corps, which the IDF had already seen as impractical, was meant to start sometime this year.

The military, in its response to a petition asking it to open additional roles to female recruits, said that the pilot would begin in November 2025 at the earliest.

The IDF said that it did not have enough tanks currently for the pilot program, as it required them for ongoing operations in the war in the Gaza Strip

• “During the course of the war, many tanks were damaged, which are disabled at this stage and are not used for combat or training, and it is not expected that new tanks will soon be introduced into the corps,” the IDF claimed in its response, which was written by the State Attorney’s Office.

The claim that the IDF lacked tanks for the pilot, due to many of them being damaged, appeared to contradict previous statements by senior officers in the military.

Several senior officers in armored units fighting in the Gaza Strip told The Times of Israel that very few tanks had been disabled beyond repair during the fighting, and damaged vehicles are normally quickly repaired and sent back into the battlefield, sometimes within just a few hours.

• In an interview last month with Channel 13 news, the chief logistics officer for the 162nd Division, Lt. Col. Efrat Baruchyan, said the unit’s tanks were on average at 92 percent competency after nine months of fighting in Gaza.

The network reported that some 500 tanks had been damaged in the war, but nearly all have returned to battle.

The IDF is also in possession of hundreds of older models of Merkava tanks, used by reservist units. Many reserve armor units were activated in the early months of the war, but its members have since been released, meaning the pilot program could potentially be conducted using older tanks that are currently not in use.

• In a later clarification, the IDF said, “We emphasize that weapons in the armor array, including tanks and munitions, are currently assigned to war as a priority over training… including a pilot for training female fighters for combat roles in maneuvering armor units.”

The mixed-gender battalions — where one all-female tank company exists — are not considered “maneuvering units,” meaning they are not trained to enter deep into enemy territory, but to stay largely within Israel’s borders and relatively close to their home bases.

This means that the soldiers serving in those units do not need to meet the same physical requirements as troops in heavy infantry brigades, who must be capable of carrying heavy gear across long distances, something that men on average are physically better suited for than women.

When the IDF first announced the Armored Corps pilot program, in September 2023, military sources said it was unclear if it would actually open, as the IDF would require a large number of women to pass the screening tests for it to make logistical sense.

An all-female Armored Corps company would be on a much larger scale than the company in Caracal.

At the time, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi believed there was a small chance the army would have enough women able to pass the screening tests to serve in the Armored Corps.

The military has been planning only gender-segregated tank crews, in large part due to issues of modesty, as in some cases crew members must use the bathroom and perform other bodily functions within the confined space of the tank.

Women already serve in a variety of combat roles in the IDF, in many cases alongside male counterparts.

Critics of gender integration in the military often decry it as a dangerous experiment with potential ramifications for national security, while defenders hail it as a long-needed measure that puts Israel on par with other Western countries.

Detractors note that some requirements for female combat soldiers have been lowered — which they say is a sign that effectiveness is being sacrificed — and that servicewomen suffer stress injuries at a higher rate.

The army has insisted in the past that it is allowing more women to serve in combat positions out of practical considerations, not due to a progressive social agenda.

• Women soldiers were directly involved in battles to defend against Hamas’s October 7 onslaught, including an all-female tank company that fought for hours, killing dozens of terrorists along the border and in communities attacked by the terror group.

Female soldiers were also among those killed by Hamas and among those taken hostage alongside their male counterparts.

The heroic and effective conduct of female combat soldiers during the attacks seems to have significantly boosted the argument for further integration into combat roles.

Source: TOI