Thanks to a sizable grant, the Jewish History Association of South Wales has begun a project to record oral histories and digitize photographs documenting Jewish life in South Wales. The BBC reports:

A century ago, 6,000 Jewish people lived in Wales; today best estimates put the population in the hundreds. Migration was driven by the industrial revolution in Wales, combined with persecution in Russia and Eastern Europe. By the late 19th century there were thriving Jewish communities in Swansea, Merthyr Tydfil, Brynmawr, Aberdare, and Pontypridd.

In the 1940s, so many Jewish workers had come to the area to support the war effort that the predominant languages heard on Treforest Industrial Estate [in the borough of] Rhondda Cynon Taff were Polish, German, and Czech. Yet by 1999 Merthyr’s once 400-strong community had disappeared altogether when George Black, “the Last Jew in Merthyr,” died at the age of eighty-two.

The History Association’s first task is to research the stories of people named on the Cardiff Reform Synagogue’s memorial tablet, . . . erected in memory of relatives of synagogue members who died in the Holocaust, and whose graves are unknown.

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.