Carmela Menashe (Hebrew: כרמלה מנשה, born 1949, Iraq) is an Israeli journalist serving as a military reporter on IDF issues, on Israel's public radio Kol Yisrael.
In 1974, Menashe started working at Kol Yisrael as a secretary.[1] After graduating from a correspondents course, she was appointed the editor of the "Tzivei Keshset" radio program. Since 1994 she has also served as the director of military reporters at Kol Yisrael.
Menashe is considered one of the most prominent journalists in Israel. Among military personalities she earned her nickname as "The mother of the [Israeli] soldiers", following exposures of many failures and scandals in the security community of the way they treated soldiers problems, and by broadcasting these matters on Kol Yisrael radio. On the other hand, she was also criticized on leading a trend, using her broadcasts, of an individual treatment of soldiers, arguing that this trend hardens the training and functioning of the IDF.
Menashe is a single mother and holds a master's degree in history of the Jewish People from Tel Aviv University. Her Thesis or dissertation in 1992 was "The illegal Aliyah from Iraq to Israel from 1941-1947", and was directed by Professor Daniel Carpi.