History made as woman named Haifa police station chief

For the first time in Israel, a woman will be in command of a major police station. Major General Ahuva Tomer will be in charge of one of the largest police stations in the country starting Sunday.

The Haifa Police station has some 500 officers and police, all of whom will be under Tomer's command. The station's deputy chief is also a woman, Chief Superintendent Etti Meirson.

This is the second time that Tomer is setting a historical precedent for women in the Israel Police Force. In 1997, she was the first woman ever to be named of a police station when she was named chief of Nahariya.

Her term, however, was cut short when a formal complaint was issued against her and her partner for allegedly scamming a psychologically troubled youth out of a sum of money.

Tomer was also accused of abusing her position when she allegedly received information from the police about one of her partner's business rivals. After a legal battle that lasted close to six years, the couple was acquitted of all claims against them.

The court even leveled criticism at the Police Internal Affairs Bureau, saying that "her investigators were blinded by the opportunity to investigate a complaint against a senior officer without checking the facts or the evidence against her."

Upon the conclusion of the legal battle, Tomer returned to the police service as Haifa's deputy police chief. She served in this position during the Second Lebanon War. In the past two years, she served as the operations officer of the Northern Police District.

Major General Tomer is considered among her peers to be a professional and admired officer. Her police colleagues noted that "the service she is doing to the status of women in the police is that she does not flaunt the fact that she is a woman at every opportunity. She simply does her job the way it's supposed to be done."