Earlier this month, Rabbi Gershom Sizomu, one of the leaders of the Abayudaya—as Uganda’s indigenous Jews are called—was sworn into his country’s parliament. Tommy Trenchard and Aurelie Marrier D’Unienville report:

The Abayudaya, which means “people of Judah” in the local Luganda language, live in a handful of eastern Ugandan villages, and they could do with some political leverage. There are fewer than 2,000 members; they make up less than 0.006 percent of Uganda’s predominantly Christian population and only 3 percent of [their region’s] Muslim-dominated population.

Sizomu’s brother, Kintu Moses Aron, [believes] Sizomu’s new position will help the community obtain the same legal rights as Christians and Muslims, including getting the government to recognize Jewish holidays so the Abayudaya can observe their traditions [more easily]. Community members also hope that Sizomu’s election will help them obtain funding for Jewish educational services and places of worship.

The Abayudaya, originally followers of a tribal leader who came to Judaism through Christianity in the early 20th century, suffered intense persecution during the reign of Idi Amin in the 1970s. More recently, they converted to Judaism under the auspices of the Conservative movement; a small group is now seeking Orthodox conversion. Last year they were formally recognized as a Jewish community by the Jewish Agency.

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.