Israeli Bren Gun Carriers

[spaddad]

Anyone have any info on Carriers in Israeli service, colour schemes, mods. equipment etc. TIA.

[Seahawk]

The best book I know on this important vehicle is Chamberlain and Ellis's Making Tracks: British Carrier Story 1914 to 1972 (Profile, 1973).  Nary a mention of Israeli vehicles in there.

[Kingsman]

I presume you've searched Google?  There are a scant few pictures on there.

 

This is about the only one that is definitely Israeli.  Did they have many?  I know that France provided 5 in 1948, but I can't work out if they were unloaded from the ship Altalena before she was sunk off Tel Aviv in faction fighting over control of the weapons cargo between the IDF and Irgun militia.  As she was off the beach rather than in harbour they may not have been, but she was an ex-LST and so had a bow ramp.

 

The preserved example at Yad La Shiron (below) is a flamethrower conversion: locally done, not a Wasp.  It has very similar markings to the one above.  Don't trust the colour: repaint.  The 3 arrows is a common early tactical marking also seen on other early vehicles.  I have no idea what the Hebrew says.  I can't make out the trackguard markings.

 

For any that were stolen from British stocks Light Stone is a strong contender.  In theory this was replaced by Light Mud in 1943 but the repaint policy was only "as required".  Only vehicles still in Desert Pink were mandated to be repainted immediately.  However, the b/w photo certainly looks darker than either of these colours.  The late war British colour would be SCC15 Olive Drab.  Ex-French vehicles might well have been this colour, or repainted in the French dark green.  IDF had not standardised a colour in those days.

 

There are a couple more at a place called Old Gesher.  The one with the additional armour is a strange green that the weathering suggests is original and not a preservation repaint.  It looks much too green to be SCC15 and as the new parts are the same colour that suggests a local colour.  The one marked "MP" could be a representation of Light Mud and might also be original.  But as this site is a museum on the site of one of the first settlements, soon attacked by Jordanian and then Iraqi forces, these are probably not Israeli vehicles.  Markings don't tally, but the non-standard trackguards match the museum vehicle above.  If anyone can enlarge, read and translate the Hebrew that might be a clue.

 

 

[spaddad]

Thanks chaps, I had seen the first photo but the others are new to me.