On patrol with Israel's female fighters - PHOTO

Based in the Negev desert, the battalion was formed in the year 2000 following mounting public pressure to allow women to serve in combat positions within the Israeli armed forces.Now, these images have offered an insight into what life is like within the battalion as the soldiers prepare for a graduation march near the Israeli-Egyptian border, near Azoz, Israel, this week.While the unit is a mixed gender unit, in 2009, about 70 per cent of the unit was female.The women who volunteer to join the unit meanwhile go through the same examinations and challenges as exclusively male battalions.The unit was named after the caracal, a desert cat that is mainly found across Africa, Central Asia, and Southwest Asia into India, and whose sexes are almost indistinguishable According to the Israel Defense Forces blog, the unit patrols the border with Egypt, protecting it from 'smugglers, infiltrators and terrorists.' In 2012, the Associated Press reported on a deadly shootout along the border between Israel and Egypt which shone a spotlight on the unit. (dailymail.co.uk)Bakudaily.Az